grandloves
by slexenskee
Summary: the power the dark lord knows not. femHarry
1. i - i

_not in chronological order - because I'm incapable of it, apparently. When it's finished I'll make a whole document version so people can just control-F the numbers through the story_

_The power the dark lord knows not._

_shouta / underage / mature themes / dark themes_

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H I D E

H I D E

( I HAVE BURNED YOUR BRIDGES )

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**PART I**

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**19.**

He has been called a lot of things in life: murderer, torturer, genius, the greatest sorcerer in the world, the Dark Lord...

Lover is a new one.

She didn't resist and he was compelled not to stop. He was gentle. Far too gentle. She is his enemy and yet he held her foolishly close, did not let a single tear fall from those bewitching eyes. They are closed now, lashes fluttering lightly in sleep. She sleeps curled up and burrowed under the blankets, until only a slip of her face is visible underneath the curve of cloth. She sleeps like she's used to cramped spaces—a cupboard under the stairs, a cot in the overflowing orphanage. She is also drooling all over his sheets.

He sneers. Such guileless trust: either she is far too stupid or far too brave to fall so peacefully asleep in the bed of her enemy.

He should wake her.

He should hex her out of his bed, throw her out. No. He should kill her. He should have killed her hours ago

(years ago)

it wasn't as if he hadn't ample opportunities. And had he not been waiting for this moment, for more than fifteen years?

Yet his hand stills against her forehead. Gently he brushes the hair away from her scar. His fingers tingle and the warmth spreads through his hand, up into the vital veins of his blood (her blood) and finally comes to rest against his soul.

He pulls it away, as if burned.

Her lashes flutter—sunlight catches on the side of her face and slides down in a curve of light, cradling her cheek and casting spiky shadows that dance with the movement. He hesitates; but they don't lift to reveal the burning green beneath them. Instead she murmurs slightly, and turns her nose into the sheets.

He wants to hate her for her innocence.

But he cannot even lift a finger against her.

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** 1**.

His eyes are on hers.

The cold metal skims beneath her chin, her eyes are wide and bright and he's seen the color many a time before, often from the tip of his own wand; a lethal flash of green.

Bone of the father, unknowingly given

Her arm bleeds profusely—it's getting everywhere, down her shirt and splattered against her cheek in a smear of red and up on her forehead, almost in the hair (how did it even get there?), dripping patterns onto the stone of his father's grave.

Flesh of the servant, freely given

This is impossible. The bane of his existence, splayed before him, defenseless and frightened; yet he cannot will himself to move.

Blood of the enemy, forcibly taken

"Harry Potter," He hisses, "We meet at long last."

His servants shiver behind him. He smells their intoxicating fear and it elicits satisfaction in him. There is nothing more rewarding than the potent smell of terror—it wafts from the girl like an alluring siren song. She shivers and his eyes trace the movement. She is terrified, but in her eyes is a fatuous anger, a bravery that will surely get her killed. By his hand, he hopes—no, he knows.

The parseltongue slides off his tongue, and he relishes the feel of the words once more, after so long without the capacity. "Have any last words, Harry? Perhaps you would like to beg…" The idea entices him; little Harry Potter, on her knees before him. "Yes, just like your mudblood mother—

"I would never give you the satisfaction!" She spits back.

He blinks, eyes narrowing. He moves towards her and she defiantly holds his stare, though she shakes so violently that her knuckles turn white in the effort to stay still. He brings his hand up, and she flinches back as he brushes her unruly hair away from her forehead, revealing the mark he made fourteen years ago.

He frowns at it, turning his gaze back to hers.

"How long have you spoken the ancient, serpent tongue?"He murmurs.

Her brow furrows warily. And then, rebelliously, "What's it to you?"

His eyes flash, and in a moment his wand is against her throat. "Answer me, you stupid girl!"

"I don't know!" She grits out, struggling away from the wood at her neck.

Unbidden, a scene unravels behind his eyes. A fat, portly muggle child with a rude face slams his hands against a glass tank. Cousin, his mind associates. Stupid, stupid cousin. He slinks cautiously over to the glass, once the fat muggle has wobbled off in dissatisfaction. He presses a small hand onto the panel separating him from a large, lazy reptile. It is cold. The snake behind the glass blinks at him—he feels a kindred spirit in the serpent. "I'm sorry about him,"He says, but it's not his mouth and it's not his voice; soft, ephemeral, as if made only of sweet light."He doesn't understand…"

He blinks out of the moment. It is not his moment. Not his memory. His gaze turns incredulous as he stares down at this slip of a girl.

She looks back. The fear and anger is overtaken by bewilderment.

He doesn't know how long he stands there, at the foot of his father's grave, looking up into the confused eyes of a little girl. Questions swim through his mind and answers are not forthcoming.

It must be some time, for finally, Pettigrew simpers behind him, "…My lord?"

"Leave us," He commands coldly, without turning around.

His servants shift nervously behind him, whispering. He whirls around in rage. "Did you not hear me?" He snarls. "Leave us! And thank your lord for such a merciful show of gratitude, for the punishment of your betrayal has been postponed!"

They bow quickly at that, a round of, "Yes, my lord," and "Thank you, my lord," murmurs through the crowd as they disapparate. Only Pettigrew is left, sniveling on his knees before him.

The dark lord narrows his eyes. "Must I repeat myself further, Wormtail? Or perhaps, you need more persuasion?"

Wormtail's eyes widen, before he shoots to his feet. "N—No, my lord!" He sputters, hastily bowing again. "Thank you, my lord!" He scrambles off quickly, tripping through the hedges as he goes.

The dark lord sneers at the pathetic sight, before he turns his attention once more towards Harry Potter. He brings a hand to her face, gripping her chin and turning her unwillingly to face him. The mix of fear and bravery is admirable, but mostly it is dangerously intoxicating.

"Look at me,"He whispers, and almost against her own volition do her eyes open and meet his. Her mind is a shimmering pool behind the green—so clear and unprotected.

And he dives in, consuming her.

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(He hadn't expected her to consume him as well)

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**2\. **

She is a horcrux.

For there is nothing else she could be.

In her eyes, in the dark spaces between the beats of her heart there lay a part of him so deeply entwined that it cannot be broken apart. He is there in the trembling of her bottom lip and the determined set of her brow, in the shallow valley of her collarbones. When she turns her striking eyes to him, they flicker red, and gray: she has the insolence of a young orphaned boy—she has all his anger and all his fears.

He wants to destroy her for this, for bringing back Tom Riddle into this world. For being a part of him he wishes so deeply to eradicate from this earth.

He stares at her for an uncomfortable length of time: she fidgets in her seat, her eyes shift from the ceiling, to the fireplace, to the patterns on the rug, avoiding his gaze with a palpable temerity.

At this point he has memorized the curve of her jaw and the subtle slope of her nose, her frightened eyes in their wide, grave sockets. Finally, after long uncertain moments of silence she turns her face away from him, brings her knees up to rest her cheek against them, staring blankly into the wall. The fire illuminates half her face in warm light, the profile of a young girl: the sweet bottom lip, the color in her cheeks and the pleasant arch of a brow. In the other side flickers Tom Riddle, darkened in shadow.

She resolutely keeps her gaze on the wallpaper. It's an unfortunate sight, a paisley print in muddy green. He'll have to burn it all off, but he holds Riddle Manor in such low regard he hasn't gotten around to it. All the furniture is at least a century old, covered in dust and unmoved since the day he swept in and murdered all its residents. She is also covered in dust. Dust, dirt, and grime—as if she's spent the better part of the afternoon traipsing through a homicidal maze, and spent the other half running from a homicidal man.

He snorts.

There may be some merit in that.

He supposes it's quite a lot for a fourteen year old girl. He's not quite sure why he cares at all about what's too much stress for a fourteen year old girl or not.

He stands in a sudden, fluid motion. The reaction in her is instantaneous: everything in her seizes up, even as she resolutely fixes her gaze on the side of the wall. Even as he looms closer, a wraith in black at the foot of her seat, she refuses to meet his gaze, stubborn until the last.

Something unerring compels him to catch her chin by his fingers, tilt her complaint head up. She moves willingly, but her eyes are wide and shaking.

"Up," He commands, and is immediately displeased with how soft it sounds. Even his voice betrays him now, it seems.

She follows, though, righting herself carefully on trembling legs, her enormous, doe-eyes peering up at him from beneath the fringe of her hair. Absentmindedly, he wonders what happened to the horrid glasses. He hopes they're sitting somewhere in the graveyard outside, crushed to pieces.

He steers her by a hand on her back, in the shallow dip between her shoulders; he can feel the tension spun between them at the touch, can almost hear the erratic beating of her heart. He leads her into the gloom, down the darkened hallway. Some time in the interim his hand manages to get caught in the unmanageable mane she calls hair, and he sneers as he attempts to wrangle it out, instead leading her by the shoulder.

The fingers skimming her collarbone make her heart jump into her throat. She can't see a thing in the hall, a skittering of light here and there, bare sounds against the grating wood—like the horror shows on the telly Dudley used to watch. But he always turned them off before they got too scary. Harry thinks, hysterically, that she might finally get to see the ending of one of those.

Get to experience it first hand.

His pace slows: she wills herself to take the wand in her hand and—and what? She can count the offensive spells she knows on one hand, two, if she's being ambitious. She'd probably need eight limbs and then some to count the ones he probably knows. It'd be an effort in futility, but the thought awakens her shaking courage. She'd rather try, at least, even if there wasn't much hope in success. Better than to be taken down into his dungeons, and, and tortured, or whatever terrible plans he had in store for his worst enemy, fighting for her life rather than just handing it over.

And by a skeletal hand on her shoulder the dark lord drags her into—

The oldest, most garish bathroom she's ever seen.

At first she can feel nothing but bewilderment at the sight, taking in the golden embellishments and the elaborate claws of the tub, centered in front of—and at this, she truly balks—an enormous, fractured stained glass window. It's only when the door shuts behind her does she get the implication of guiding her in here, and flushes all the way down to her toes.

She suddenly feels very stupid. Stupid, and caked in dirt, and embarrassed beyond mortification.

It takes a very, very long time to shed her clothes onto the floor. She's checked the lock on the door three times—she has her wand, for merlin's sake. She's not quite defenseless. The idea of standing naked not even twenty paces away from the most violent dark lord in history is… alarming, regardless.

Her eyes do not leave the door as she edges closer to the tub, turns on the faucet to hear it squeak and groan to life. She lets the water run for a bit; at first it is an awful color, and after much too cold—before she even attempts to dip a toe in.

She jumps in quickly after that, hiding herself in the murky bathwater.

It's not the most pleasant smelling, but something tells her that has more to do with her and less to do with the water. It takes a good, long while to wring out her hair, long and tangled as it is, and even longer to rub off all the dirt and blood. When she's finished the tub is absolutely vile, and she must drain and fill it three more times before she's close to anything approaching clean.

Harry does not wonder on how long she spends in the sprawling, ornate bathroom. She hopes it is a long, long time. Long enough for eternity to have swung past; long enough for the dark lord in the gloom outside to have disappeared.

It is a false hope.

Gingerly she steps back into her grime-slicked outfit from before, cringing as it clings to her skin.

When she finally manages to convince herself to open the door, anticlimactically, no one is on the other side. The hallway is devoid of anything but cobwebs. There is, however, a dull light in the distance, illuminating a small shaft of the dilapidated corridor. She shuffles closer, fear cold and cloying, crawling up her neck. She reaches the entrance of the light: it is a small, mostly unused looking room. There is a bed, a small chest of drawers, a window swathed by dark, moth eaten curtains. There also appears to have been some attempt of a cleaning charm. This was mostly in vain, however; this house is far beyond the redemption of an evanesco.

She blinks, lost.

Harry moves further into the room, unable to process. The lamp on the bedside table is on, evidence that someone had opened the door and turned it on. There is only one other person in this deteriorating mansion. But she cannot imagine him coming in here, turning on the light, keeping the door open—doing up a bed. She puts a hand on the sheets. They are new. Starched, still.

Just like Aunt Petunia's, she thinks, hysterical.

It is clear that he did—but she still cannot come up with a reason as to why. Why… did he not end her earlier, in the graveyard? Why had he not, when he had ample opportunity to do so afterwards? She could have been dead in any of the moments from the graveyard leading up to when she stepped into this room.

But she isn't.

She moves towards the drawers, drawing her fingers against the wood. She holds them up to her face. Devoid of dust. When she pulls upon one of the rusting handles, she is stunned to find the entire bureau empty but for a pale, lemon yellow dress.

She holds it out in front of her, floored by the implications. Her first, startling and hysterical thought is that the dark lord appears to believe she dresses ten years younger than her age. She turns it around, inspecting it in the dim wintry spill of the lamp. It is… pretty. There are pleats, and buttons that shine opalescent in the light. She cannot imagine anything so delicate coming out of Lord Voldemort's wand.

As she inspects it, she wonders again why he has not killed her. And he has not just staved off her imminent end, but also appears to be going out of his way—very out of his way—for her comfort.

The thought is strange and foreboding.

This does not stop her from pulling the dress over her head.

It's a bit too big, but regardless it is infinitely better than wearing her previous clothes. She sits on the side of the bed, fisting her hands into the hem of the dress. It crumples in her palms; the softest fabric she's every felt. Aunt Petunia would have never let her wear something like this.

But she is restless, and uneasy. She cannot stay here in this small, moth-eaten room, even though she is empty and exhausted and could probably keel over onto the bedspread.

Instead Harry jumps up, bare feet padding quietly against the aging wood. She grips the fabric in her hands tightly, and heads back into the dark jaw of the hallway. She does not know how she finds him: she has no light, and no knowledge of this house. But, like instinct, she finds herself turning through the halls and walking up the stairs, until she comes to another room alit with a warm glow.

She summons up her courage, or whatever is left of it, and demands, voice breaking, "What do you want from me?"

He looks up, indifferent. "Nothing," comes the ominous reply. He motions toward the seat opposite of him. "Sit."

There is nothing she would like less.

She could deny him, of course, but where would that get her? She learned long ago to choose her battles wisely; there were only so many times she could go without food before it became unbearable. It is with great reluctance that she trudges across the room and folds herself, limpid, in the chair across from him.

He looks as if he is made from the shadows that cling against the walls; they wrap around him like a second skin, crawl up into the inky tendrils in his cloak, obscuring everything but his face from view. She does not want to look into the darkness, nor his face, so she does not. Instead, her gaze fixates upon the cup of tea set in front of him, decidedly untouched. How strange, she thinks. The dark lord taking tea, at this hour? There are far more pertinent questions to contemplate, but she finds she doesn't have the energy for anything else but this.

It has steeped for a long time; the tea has dyed the water the dark color of blood. How fitting.

She struggles to bring her gaze back towards him.

She should have been a Slytherin—she thinks, wildly. Maybe the hat was right. Maybe that was where she belongs. It feels as if all her bravery has left her long ago. She does not want to face this with courage and determination: she wants to hide.

Finally, her stubbornness lifts its head. "Why… am I here?"

The dark lord does not answer her.

"Tea?" He asks instead, as if that is a perfectly reasonable response.

She sputters. "No," She gets out, finally. "No, I do not want tea. I want to know why I'm here."

Lord Voldemort sighs. The gesture is quite human and quite startling.

"W—What are you going to do to me?" She asks in his silence, terror clawing up her throat. One hand fists into the hem of her dress—at this point, it is quite irreparably wrinkled from all the times she has done it—and the other clings to her wand.

"Nothing."

This sparks a brief and futile anger. "Will you stop saying nothing?" She bites out, as if she has a death wish. The dark lord's eyes narrow, but he makes no discernible moves to end her life.

"It is late," he observes at great length. "You should sleep."

Harry blinks, rapidly. "I'm sorry?" She balks. "You—… I'm not going to sleep here! I couldn't, anyway. How could you expect me to sleep in a place with—

Lord Voldemort stands to his full height in one smooth motion, and the words die a still death in her throat. She doesn't see his wand move, nor does she hear the incantation off his lips. But her eyes grow heavy and the world blurs, and then she does not see of hear anything at all.

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**3.**

Harry does not open her eyes.

He has pulled the curtains wide open; morning diffuses the room in an effervescent light. Warmth patterns against her face and curls around her shoulders, speckles her hair. He thinks perhaps he should have transfigured her dress into a set of pajamas; unfortunately, he knows even less about girl's sleepwear than he does girl's clothing in general.

He should have returned her in the night. No, he should have killed her, but it appears he is wholly incapable of that. He should have deposited her back at Hogwarts, perhaps left her at the front gate like some kind of offering.

If he was not going to kill her, he should have let her go.

And yet, he could not.

So here she sleeps onwards, tilted into the sun, listless in her dreams. He cannot give her up, he realizes. She is his infinite weakness now; his very soul, embodied in such a fragile form. He could snap her with just the lightest touch of dark magic—almost did, with the stone scythe of his father's grave. There is a mottled purple bruise that crawls up the side of her arm. He turns it over gently; on the other, an enormous, stained gash from where Pettigrew butchered into her wrist.

He does not quite touch it when she jerks awake, leaping upright and looking as if she has swallowed a lemon. Or perhaps a scream. It's hard to tell. She stares at him with the wide eyes of prey; immobile. If possible, her hair has become even more of a mess. It lights like fire in the morning sun.

He feels as if he should say something—but he no longer remembers how to communicate with young girls, if he ever knew at all. It has been a long time since he even needed to hold polite conversation; his words have been law for some time now. At any rate, there is no need for him to explain himself to a foolish little girl. The sight of her still throws him off balance; the livid fear and anger in her burning gaze, the small trembling fingertips. Everything he lives to forget exists in her.

He reaches for her arm. She flinches violently, but does not move to take it back. With a wave of his hand the enflamed and mangled wound Wormtail left in her skin mends back together, leaving a creamy, smooth surface in its wake. He holds her hand for an unnervingly long time afterwards.

He wants to destroy her. He wants to tear her apart—to ruin her.

It wouldn't be too hard: she is so small and defenseless. She holds her wand tightly in her hand but in that tiny, little hand it's as meaningless as piece of wood against him. But the visage of Tom Riddle drifts over her like a gossamer memory; his large, frightened eyes, all his ambition, all his determination and all his dreams swallowed in the thin line of her lips.

She snatches her hand back. "Are you going to tell me why I'm here?" She blurts, looking defiant and yet so very afraid.

"No," and then, to her look of protest, "for there is no reason."

She blinks, twice. "Huh?"

And then, when he does not deign this with a response; "But… if I'm not here for any particular reason—and you don't want anything from me…" And with this, a faltering look towards him, "And you haven't killed me…"

She trails off, eyes wide and beguiling. "I don't understand," She says at length.

That would make two of them, then.

"No harm will come to you here," He returns after some time has passed.

"And you expect me to believe this?" She retorts, incredulous and hysterical.

"Yes," his eyes narrow, patience thinning. But it would not do to lose his temper. "You are… of great importance to me, Harry." He hedges, ambiguous.

There are a lot of things she could say to that. The majority of them involve a lot of yelling, hysteria, and maybe even some tears.

None of them come out.

"Oh," she squeaks, as if this could possibly encompass everything rattling inside her. And then, "…Why?"

He sits for some time. "Perhaps it is best if you do not know." Is his enigmatic return. The idea of relaying the split contents of his soul—and ultimately, the keys to his immortality—to anyone, even a living, breathing part of him, instills a vague sense of terror in him. No, best to let her ponder on it. She may not know the true depths of what the information would mean, but undoubtedly there are those who would seek it out from her.

She eyes him warily. "But you've always tried to kill me." She points out, needlessly. It's clear they're both intimately aware of this. In fact, it almost happened yesterday.

His heart clenches unwillingly at the very thought, with an emotion he'd long since thought he'd discarded: fear. It would have been all too easy to fell his own immortality, his precious little horcrux, in but a brief moment. And he would have never been the wiser. All those times he'd made for her life—for his life, as it were—without even knowing.

"Yes," he concedes, gravely. "It was… remiss of me." As much as it pained him to say it. "I was not made aware of certain crucial elements of our… connection."

If possible, she looks even more confused.

"Harry," he sighs. "I do not use my word lightly, but I will promise you this: no harm will come to you here."

She startles at her name. If possible, she looks even more frightened by his ambiguous attempts at explanation. She remains weary, as if waiting for him to strike her.

"Our connection," she repeats. "Why? What's so important about it?"

He studies her closely. "Have you not wondered, Harry," he begins, and he does not miss the shiver that crawls along her arms at the use of her name. "Why your scar burns with my anger? Why you can speak the ancient serpent tongue—a trait which can only be passed through the blood of Salazar Slytherin?"

She, warily, shakes her head.

"We share a bond, Harry," he explains. "Made on that fateful Hallow's Eve night. It is why you can speak to snakes, when I am the last living descendant of Slytherin. It is why you feel my thoughts, and I yours."

"And because of this, you…promise not to hurt me?" Her brows furrow.

He continues to study her calculatingly. There is a glint in his eye she doesn't recognize. "Yes," he says at length. "This is exactly why."

He reaches for her hand again, and she does not fight him. He traces long, skeletal fingers upon the thin blemish marring the mended skin of her wrist. A sudden thought blooms within him: she is his. And he has always been fiercely possessive of the few things he can truly call his own.

"What does it mean, exactly?" She pauses, worrying at her lip. "Our…connection, I mean."

His eyes wander away from the pallid skin of her arm, up to the burning, effervescent eyes, as bright and as unrelenting as the killing curse. Tom Riddle was a collector of fine and rare objects, but he doesn't think he's ever possessed something as exquisite as her.

"It means you are mine."

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The dark lord does not dine with others often.

And when he does, the company he keeps does not normally take the form of a young, insolent girl.

Harry Potter pushes her food around awkwardly, a quiet presence by his side. She appears to finally have finished her meal—this is only after downing about three or four servings. He doesn't blame her for that—from what he could divulge from her mind, it would seem that she must make up for years without any servings at all.

She hasn't spoken a word since he had proclaimed her as his, and doesn't look compelled to break her spell of silence. From what he saw in her memories, this is rather atypical behavior. In any legitimate regard, Harry Potter appears to have two modes: listless and lonely, or determined and incredibly vocal. He does not think she falls into either in her current state.

She puts her fork down, quite suddenly, turning to him with big, bright eyes. He is struck by their color in the morning sunlight as much as he is with the fact that she consistently manages to look him in the eye: he can count very few people who can, and most of them are his enemies. They burn in the sun with a viridity that could take his breath away if he's not careful; like bewitching black magic, like avada kadevra.

"I want to go home," runs out of her mouth, stilted and abrupt.

He holds her gaze with a certain apathy. He takes a few second to fully digest her sentence—the words are so strung together it appears to be one elongated amalgamation of vowels and consonants. Her throat works.

"To Hogwarts," she elaborates, and then, words tumbling after the other; "I want to go back to school!"

As it is, he cannot find any words past his incredulity. He cannot remember the last time someone dared to raise their voice against him.

"Please."

That is normally quite alluring. He has always been more partial to begging, it's true. He relishes the power he holds over people when they are stripped to nothing, when all they have left to do is plead for their very lives. Somehow, it is infinitely less appealing out of her mouth.

He waves her off. "I will return you in due time." Quite honestly, there's no real reason to keep her. He doesn't even know himself what has compelled him to keep her here; why he had taken a foolish five minutes to look around the dilapidated mansion, attempting to find a usable room for her. To wave his wand and clean the dust and muck from it, to turn on the light, to conjure pillows and a blanket and a small yellow sundress.

Why he was going through the effort at all.

"Oh," she replies, subdued. "Well, alright then." It's clear there's another question held on the tip of her tongue, but she only lowers her gaze, fixating her alarming green irises towards her food.

She makes the effort to be less obtrusive after that, sliding her eggs around in some approximation of a marathon. Running eggs. Hah. Runnyeggs. This entertains her for some time.

The dark lord rises out of his chair, startling her out of her daydreams. He gives her no explanation as he abruptly turns on his heel; a black wraith wandering down the halls. Harry stills over her food; she doesn't know whether to follow him, or if she's supposed to stay here.

She supposes that if the dark lord had wanted her to follow… she would have known that by now. He does not appear to be the kind of man who likes to be kept waiting.

Harry sighs, and her eyes drift listlessly about the room.

It looks about as unused as the rest of the place; dust is thick and diffused into the soft light. Panels of sun shift demurely on the wooden floor, Harry finds herself drawn towards them, and ultimately towards an archaic armchair by the window. It's far too large for her, and she draws her knees up and peers out the window. The glass has long since mottled into a gray haze, dirt crawling along the edges, spindly cracks erupting from the corners.

She thinks she can see part of a garden, can make out the horizon line in the distance. The sun is warm and inviting, and it's not long before she dozes off.

Harry doesn't know how long she sits, curled in the chair, but the patterns of sun on the wooden floor have sifted into other forms by the time the dark lord returns to the room.

He moves to wake her, before ultimately thinking better of it. Perhaps it will be easier this way. At least she won't ask difficult questions when she's asleep. Light draws upon her face with romantic affection; she sleeps onwards, unaware or perhaps uncaring of the dark lord looming over her; death himself, a quiet calamity above her shoulder.

For good measure he casts a sleep charm over her, and draws a hand towards her. He could have sneered at his willingness, but as it is his hand easily finds its way into her impossible hair, softer than he'd think from the look of it. His hand drifts to her shoulder, where he presses hard enough for a sturdy grip to apparate.

Within moments they're standing at the gates of Hogwarts—a picture he has not seen in many decades sprawling before him.

He does not take the time to admire the sight, laying her upon the grass. In this weather, the yellow sundress will be ruined with mud. She mumbles incoherently, turning into his hand.

With great reluctance he draws back, and pulls away before he's compelled to steal her away again.

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When Harry thinks back on her day with the Dark Lord, she feels as if she dreamed the entire encounter.

The whole ordeal was absurd, and she found she couldn't find any way to describe it—so she didn't say anything at all. The teachers fussed over her, escorting her into the hospital wing, where they fluttered around her with an unending stream of questions, the majority of which she could not hear. There must have been water in her ears, for she felt submerged in a deep pool.

For the most part, no one probed her particularly with questions; when it became clear that she was in no condition to answer, Madame Pomfrey concluded that she was in shock, and none of this attention was helping, and shooed everyone out of the wing. It is Professor Snape who stays the longest, a strange, unreadable expression on his face. She thinks he seemed angry. At her? It's true he has never been particularly fond of her. In fact, for the duration of her stay at Hogwarts he has gone out of his way to avoid her at all costs. She meets his gaze accidentally; he flinches violently, and then storms out the door in the wake of the rest of the teachers. Madame Pomfrey makes good on her word and does not allow anyone back into the wing.

Harry was glad for it, to be frank. She didn't know how she could answer any questions without bringing up the fact that she slept in a bed the Dark Lord made for her, and sat in a sunlit, cob-webbed room and had tea and pastries by his side.

She didn't know what she expected of the murderer of her parents: a strange amalgamation of Count Dracula and the boy from the diary, she thinks, for those are truly the only sources she has to draw from. He wasn't, though. To that end, she didn't know what he was. The real truth of the matter was that he didn't say enough for her to accurately discern him.

She didn't dream it. She has a fine, trailing line of white against the thin skin of her wrist where a healing spell has mended the wound. She places two fingers where the winding line ends, in the apex of her hand and wrist.

No, that wasn't a dream.

But her actual dreams are just as concerning.

When Harry is finally released into Gryffindor tower she can feel nothing but relief that her year mates are all sound asleep; she wants to deal with their questions even less than she does the professors.

And when she tucks herself against the familiar cotton, noses into the sheets, her eyes slip close and colors bloom behind them.

There is a small boy behind her eyes, crouching in the grass. A crumbling, unsteady sky casts shifting kaleidoscope light across the ground, his face, the edges of his knees.

He ' s holding an acorn in his hands, rubbing its smooth side absentmindedly with his thumb as he watches a group of children out in the distance; indiscernible moving colors, occasionally dispersed by the bright noise of laughter, a sparkle of rime upon the edges of the afternoon.

All at once he feels terribly alone.

Her eyes slip open in the morning; a sorrow that is not hers clings to the corners of her eyes.

.

.

Cedric has won the Tri-Wizard Tournament, and Harry is simply glad to see it over. She's also glad she pushed him onto the cup. She had no idea how she would explain away her disappearance with the Dark Lord otherwise. That—and if she hadn't, Cedric probably wouldn't have been alive to win the cup anyhow.

He, like everyone else, was incredibly worried over her twenty-four hours missing. She hedged most of the questions, before finally coming up with some kind of coherent story.

"I don't remember much," She says, evasive. "I ran… and ran… I must have stopped eventually. But when I woke up, I was already in the hospital wing! Professor Mcgonagall said they'd found me in the front of the school."

Cedric's eyes widen with worry. "And um…" He pales considerably. "The uh…"

"Voldemort?" Harry fills in, raising a brow.

"Yeah, him," Cedric's voice lowers. "What—what happened? He's really back?"

She shrugs.

Earlier that morning Fudge had commandeered her out of her first class, insisting to have a complete run down of everything she remembered. She was completely honest about the events with the cup and the graveyard; the assembled death eaters, the rising of the dark lord. Fudge did not appear to want to believe any of it—in fact, he spent a lot of time denying everything and calling her a deluded young child who may be suffering from a severe concussion.

Normally Harry would have taken offense to this; if there was one thing she was not, it was a liar. But she couldn't refute him with anything more than half-heartedness. This was mostly due to the fact she couldn't assemble any kind of reaction on the dark lord at all. In fact, she was almost somewhat relieved; how would she explain that after the dark lord resurrected himself, he vanquished his followers, took her into the mansion, and gave her a yellow sundress? No, best to let him believe what he will.

"I guess so."

"Fudge doesn't believe me," Cedric scowls. "I told him the truth! He won't listen, though; he's got it in his head that I'm making it all up."

"Let him, then," Harry returns. "We know. And our friends will believe us. Warn everyone you know. I'm sure Voldemort—" He cringes at the name, "Will reveal himself eventually, and there'll be a point when Fudge won't be able to deny it any longer."

"You're right," Cedric agrees with a great capitulation, irritation clear on his face. "I just—I wish there was more I could do."

Harry felt as if she should feel the same. She couldn't summon up much indignation, however. The confusion was still too prevalent in her thoughts. Instead, she simply nods.

The rest of the day passes in an unremarkable haze. A few brave Gryffindors move to offer their concern; Harry ducks out of their wary gazes, finds excuses to get out of them or simply thanks them, and refuses to say anything else. She knows that's what they want. As it is, she cannot even bring herself to explain it to Hermione and Ron, her dearest friends. They above all watch her with indubitable worry—they are the only ones who know even an inkling of the truth. An inkling of what it was like to face the dark lord.

She cannot tell them.

The school year trudges sluggishly on by—nothing of great interest occurs, aside from a half-hearted farewell to the visitors of their school. No one is greatly moved by this event, nor by the celebrations of the end of term thereafter. There is a foreboding shadow looming over the students; it is clear they've believed Cedric to some degree. He is a Hufflepuff, and as much as Fudge would like to deny it the events of the last trial did happen. It's a rather illustrious thing to simply make up.

Harry doesn't expend much effort in taking Cedric's side; she also doesn't do anything to disprove him, either. When students flock to ask her quietly of the events (of which they do, always, and sometimes not so quietly) she agrees with Cedric that it happened, but refuses to go into much further detail.

It's difficult to quash the rumors through the media. Cedric and his father are reputable and well known characters; slandering them has remained a trying task for Fudge all year. He does try, of course. He also does not spare her, either, even if she isn't outright defying his claims.

Harry flops onto her bed at the end of yet another tiring day, quick to tug her curtains closed before Hermione can move in for another interrogation. She means well—and Harry would have welcomed the patient and listening ear of her closest friend had she the words or capacity to tell anyone else of her encounter with the dark lord. As it is, she finds it hard to reconcile the event even to herself.

Harry rubs a hand over her eyes, and falls into a weary sleep.

The boy is in them—he is so small and fragile, she thinks he could drift apart in the morning wind. He has such wide and uncertain eyes; he stares ahead into the fading sky, a large and looming watery grave above. His loneliness clings at the bottom of her heart; his sorrow is overwhelming in the cage of her ribs. He is bitter, and angry. He is all at once terribly alone. He does not understand himself, much less the world around him. There are no small comforts for him.

He wanders around the diluted gray halls, a wisp of a wraith, nothing but a pair of bright gray eyes to remark upon his humanity. Other children push past him, haggard adults step around him—none look at the young boy who maunders aimlessly through the corridors. There are other boys his age out in the yard, playing a game made from stones. He longs to join them; but time has long since taught him to stay rooted in the doorway. They will not welcome him.

Harry opens her eyes some time later; they are wet and bright with tears.

.

.

.

** 4.**

Harry doesn't make it to Privet Drive that summer.

The Hogwarts Express pulls into King's Cross all too soon, halting its journey with an abrupt and unannounced lurch. Harry wishes fervently that she could crawl underneath the seat and stay in here forever. Anything was a better alternative than Privet Drive. Aside from her bizarre memories, and even more alarming dreams, the Tri-Wizard Tournament seems an eternity away. The events replay in her mind as if they happened to someone else, as if they were all just secret adventures whispered to her in the dead of night.

She rubs a palm across her forehead wearily, awoken suddenly by the train pulling in to the station.

They could have been, and yet there is a small orphaned boy who continues to haunt her dreams.

She blinks out of her reverie, and follows Ron's loud and unperturbed voice down the corridors. They meet with the twins some ways down the hall, and then onwards they spill out onto the platform.

She rubs warily at her forehead, where her scar tingles not unpleasantly. Her friends do not notice; Hermione is visibly leaping into her mother's arms, and Ron is protesting loudly at some of the stories the twins have begun to tell their parents about his antics during the school year, but his cheeks are flushed and he leans into the touch of his father's hand against his head. The scene instills within her a loneliness that she hasn't felt in a long time. She has no parents to see: no home to go back to.

Suddenly her eyes are drawn into the far distance; wandering mist obscures the ends of the platform, but there is a figure standing in sharp relief of the billowing steam.

He looks familiar, though she's never seen him before.

Her feet lead her along the pass, heedless of her mind, which protests loudly that the Dursely's are probably irritable in the parking lot, and her heart, which thuds loudly and oppressively in her chest.

She comes to a halt in front of him. He has a set of piercing dark eyes set onto a strikingly handsome face; there is a decidedly resolute set to his brow, but a coldness in his mouth and sharp chin.

"Tom," she says, because there is no one else he could possibly be.

"Harry," he nods, once, in greeting.

She wants to ask him what he's doing here. It'd be a completely rational thing to do; this is the Hogwarts express, she's fairly sure each and every person here would run in terror if they knew who this pleasant face belonged to. As it is, she peers up at him, wordless. He keeps her gaze with an unreadable expression.

It comes to her, then.

The only logical reason for his presence.

She clasps the handle of her suitcase tightly. "Where are we going?"

He holds out his hand—

And she takes it without hesitation.

.

.

.

**23.**

He worries greatly when she is not in his line of sight.

However he has grown used to the shuddering in his heart when she is not by his side, as they spend more than half the year apart. In those long months the only consolation is the soft thrum against the cold bones of his ribs, that he has long since recognized belongs to her; to the little piece of his soul that ties them together. But for now, the summer months are long and sweet, and it alarms him vaguely when he turns his attention towards her, and finds her mysteriously absent.

It is not all that difficult to find her. He rounds the bend of the manor, towards the pass to the graveyard.

She is stalactite still as she stares into the wicked sky: as if she is waiting for time itself, in the deep places full of light and lament.

She must feel him, for she turns slightly, transfixing a single, luminous eye his direction underneath a fringe of fiery hair, profile thrown into a brilliant white light.

The hem of her dress is lopsided and some ways short, reminding him of her transient existence; a constant, vivacious presence that slips in and out of time. It's his dress. A bit of yellow fabric he had half-heartedly spelled into existence. How could something so insignificant become so meaningful to him?

She'll grow bigger still, though for now the cloying adolescent skin drapes over her in a lovely embrace; clinging in the hollow behind her knees, the dip in her shoulders; it hides in all his beloved places. She has yet to grow into her legs, long and coltish, and the contours of her countenance appear to shift and change everyday.

And though she is timeless in this moment, she will leave as well, and the thought makes something cold grow within him. Death will wrap his luxurious arms around her wide and burning eyes, tuck himself into the corners of her lips, and drag her into his sweet sorrow; leaving the dark lord in his lonesome dynasty.

Terror seizes him at the very thought.

.

.

.

**5\. **

The summer rolls along with a burning, ephemeral heat. There is no air conditioner in Riddle Manor—lacking perhaps the only good thing she can acknowledge about Number 4 Privet Drive—and Harry spends long hours moping listlessly in the oppressive heat. She's not quite sure how Voldemort stands it; probably through a charm or two he won't teach her. She hasn't the opportunity to ask, however, for she has seen neither hide nor tail of the dark lord since summer has started.

She frowns.

He's probably doing… dark lord things. She doesn't want to think on what those could possibly be.

Instead she dawdles around in her room, or sometimes in the quiet, cooler rooms of the manor, whittling away the hours either exploring the dusty corridors and sun-spotted rooms or out in the yard underneath the willow tree. Occasionally Nagini accompanies her, when the dark lord has no need of her. She doesn't make for the most pleasant of company, or the most interesting for that matter, but at the very least sheis company, and Harry has had none of that so far. Still, thus far it has been an infinitely better summer than any she's spent at Privet Drive.

The sun sears the bottom of the sky in a wrathful red as Harry heads inside. It's cooler, finally, and the fireflies speckle the yard in bright spots of light. The light in the study is on, and she finds the dark lord quite engaged in a large, dusty, and quite mean-spirited tome. It continuously attempts to eat his hand, and he continuously swats it back down.

She hesitates by the door frame—she knows by experience now that he is always aware of where she is at all times, and will not be surprised nor startled to see her here. And though he has never admonished her otherwise, she's not sure how welcome her presence is.

Finally, she swallows her hesitation and walks up to the bookshelves, as if she could possibly understand any of the texts lining the shelves. She wrings her hands behind her back, before she pivots abruptly on her toes, blurting suddenly, "I need new shoes."

He looks up, bereft of expression.

It is true, though she can privately admit that the logical process in which she'd come to the announcement was missing in the most axiomatic manner possible.

But, she'd been thinking on her stay here, and what she was and wasn't allowed to do. Aunt Petunia was always very strict and forthcoming with what Harry could and could not do, what she could and could not wear, what she could eat (if she could eat at all) and where she could go. Lord Voldemort appears to have no rules for her at all. And, her sandals had broke her first week here, and she'd sort of been running around barefoot since, and it was beginning to get rather unseemly, and also quite difficult, as it had been raining more often than not and walking around in the mud was quite unpleasant.

"I mean," she flushed. "I need to go out. And buy new shoes. Can I do that?"

"I'm not keeping you here," he replies distantly, returning to his text. It bites his hand. He swats it away.

"Right," she agrees, faltering slightly. It doesn't sound like approval or disapproval. It doesn't sound like anything at all.

Typical.

"Okay," she says, slowly, as if testing the waters. "Then tomorrow I'm going to go to the town down the hill."

This is met with staunch indifference.

She pouts, and then turns and walks out the door. Well, that's that, then. It appears there was no reason to ask for permission at all—he wouldn't have an opinion either way. When she thinks on it this way, it does seem quite silly. He is the dark lord. Surely he has better things to do than tell her what she can and can't do?

Then, it comes to her that perhaps he just doesn't know how. Or that perhaps he feels that she will vehemently oppose any and all rules he sets. The Tom Riddle in her dreams would feel embittered and unsettled by anyone ordering him around—and for good reason, too. The people of authority in his life were certainly cause for concern.

As she trudges up to her room, she tries to reconcile the boy in her dreams to the stony man down the hall.

It's still not working all that well.

.

.

When she awakes the next morning, there is an enormous, unnecessarily large sack of muggle money on the pillow by her head.

.

.

"I'm going down into the muggle town today,"she tells the garden snake, quiet, like a secret.

It's not quite bright enough to understand her, but it hisses delightedly. She thinks it's happy for her.

She puts it down as she reaches the end of the ill-kept lawn of Riddle Manor. It slithers into the wild tufts of grass and disappears from sight.

Harry looks down at herself. She is wearing one of the four outfits she has—this one is a pair of shorts now too small for her and an oversized, old shirt of Dudley's that depicts some kind of footie team she doesn't recognize. She has no shoes. Harry thinks with delight on how scandalized Aunt Petunia and the woman of Privet Drive would be seeing her walk around Tesco's like this.

The thought instills a sense of jovial contentment in her as she follows the dirt road down into town. Or rather, she thinks the road leads into town. It is the only road in sight, and she hopes she's chosen the right direction.

It's some time, and there doesn't appear to be an end to the maundering road. It has since turned into pavement, and Harry balances along the edge of the road, entertaining herself by attempting to walk on her tiptoes in a straight line. It's not working all that well.

Finally, after she trips one too many times a sputtering truck ambles its way down the battered road, slowing parallel to her.

The window rolls down, and at first all Harry can see is a tuft of beard and what appear to be sentient eyebrows.

"Aye there, lassy," the eyebrows greet in a thick Irish accent. "This is no place for a little miss to be walking down the road!"

"It isn't?" She tilts her head. "Well, you see, I'm trying to get to the next town over—

"Blackburn?" He interrupts.

"Sure," she agrees.

He scowls. Or rather, she thinks he scowls. Behind all the hair, it's hard to say. "Hop in. You'll spend the day getting over there at this rate."

She feels as if some point in her life someone had warned her against getting into cars with strangers. But when she recounts all the memorable events in her life, she notes that most of them do, indeed, involve following strangers into strange places.

The truck is lopsided and BBC Radio 1 shifts in and out of focus, and it smells sort of like chickens and cigarettes. It's not all that bad, though, even though she doesn't know any of the songs or most of the DJs. Nick Grimmeshaw speaks avidly about some new pop band and two apparently very gay members in it—or at least, he is whenever the radio sifts out of static. Blackburn tumbles over the hill in a sprawl of squat, concrete buildings. Other cars join them on the road, merging inwards from intricate, curving highways. She stares numbly into the cityscape, the road signs and the street lamps, and tries to reconcile what she sees now to what she saw an hour ago.

It's unsettling to think how such terribly different worlds can live so close together.

"Where in Blackburn do you need to go?" The eyebrows ask again.

She shrugs. "Asda?" It's where Aunt Petunia always got her clothes. It wasn't much of an outing, however—normally Aunt Petunia would grab the cheapest garments she could find and never bothered to see if they would fit. Almost on impulse she blurts, "Debenhams, if there's one here?"

The burly man says nothing to this. Harry almost feels as if he should laugh; Aunt Petunia certainly would, if she asked to shop at a posh department store like that. Actually, Aunt Petunia would laugh, and then turn red with fury, and maybe whack her with a spatula.

It's almost too soon that he's pulling into a large strip of stores. Harry suddenly feels alarmed—alarmed, and incredibly underdressed. There are girls her age in trendy muggle outfits, loitering with boys, roving in packs. She feels even more disconnected from them than usual. She doesn't pay them much attention, almost all of it diverted towards the looming metal structure towering above her. She remembers to profusely thank the old man for going out of his way to drive her. He smiles (or she thinks he does) beneath his beard and waves cheerily as he drives away, leaving her standing alone with no shoes in front of the department store.

.

.

.

Four hours and half the sack of money later, she finally has her pair of shoes.

And a lot more than that.

.

.

.

The Dark Lord Voldemort appears like an indeterminable wraith in the blended shadow of an oak tree some ways away. He could have been a flicker in her imagination, a figure dripping in darkness, so wholly belonging there it was as if the shadows themselves twined around him—had she not been viscerally aware of his presence the moment she walked out the door. Harry would have been more startled at his appearance, but it had long since surprised her that the dark lord knew where she was at all times.

It had also long since stopped surprising her that she seemed to share this uncanny ability as well.

She shuffles over to his shadowy throne, feeling strangely unsatisfied. Magic tingles against her bare skin as she moves towards him— out of one world and into another.

"Are you ready?" He intones, devoid of inflection. He does, however, spare a sneer in the direction of the Muggle strip. Quite frankly, Harry's surprised he hasn't burned the whole thing down.

She holds up her bags and nods.

This is how her first apparition trip begins.

When it is over, she decides she never wants to do it again.

The dark lord releases her as the world rights itself in front of the dilapidated Manor; he drifts inside the house without a backwards glance, leaving her to balance her new belongings and follow.

He stops stock still in the foyer, and she almost bumps into him in her attempt to fit through the door. She blinks. Was he waiting for her? He takes one look at her bags, and makes what she thinks is a condescending face. With a wave of his hand, they wrench out of her grip, floating themselves in a singular march up the stairs, presumably to her room. She watches them bob their way up the staircase, wondering what to do now.

She turns her attention reluctantly towards the dark lord. Her eyes lower; she scuffs the floor in an untimed rhythm with her foot. "Thank you," She says, at great length, chancing a glance at him. He appears unmoved. "For, um, the clothes… and picking me up. You didn't have to do that."

"Had I not, you would have invariably spent the night wandering your way home."

She shrugs.

"A dangerous endeavor, indeed," his eyes narrow, as if his thoughts had found their way to something else. "Consult with me first before you decide to embark on another."

She nods. "Right." The first rule he's laid since she came here. She wonders what significance it holds. He could have given her thousands of restrictions—why this one?

He pivots smartly on his heel, and then he is off, a dark, billowing form of darkness in the gloom of the hall.

He gives no indication for her to follow, so she watches his figure fade back into blackness with a forlorn, indecipherable expression. After some time, she shakes her head, moving to the room. Her room. This gives her pause.

She's never had a room of her own before.

She's had a cupboard, and a loaned room full of toys that weren't hers. Never had she had a space to truly call her own. Her breath catches, and she opens the door as if it is to a place she's never been to before. The interior has not changed; dust runs rampant and unyielding in the corners where she can't chase them out; the curtains are heavy and besotted with cobwebs, sparse light seeps from them, as if caught in a marmoreal glow. Her bed is rumpled and unmade, because Aunt Petunia isn't here to scold her for not doing it.

Harry's eyes lower onto the neatly lined bags in the center of the room. One by one, she takes the garments out, folds them properly into the chest of drawers. Next are her shoes, which she straightens neatly beneath her bed. Soon she finds herself cleaning the entirety of the room—moving her trunk to the corner, thrusting the curtains away to open the windows, heaving the drawer to the far wall.

A quite murmur drifts into the room, and Harry turns to see her beloved owl perched on the windowsill, cocking her head at her master.

Harry smiles, laying the last of her most precious things on her bedside table. A book from Hermione, a quill from Ron, a tarnished ring and a small red ribbon from a pouch of Bertie Bott's Every Flavored Beans—her first real purchase in the wizarding world.

"Hello," She greets, moving to sit upon the sill. Hedwig hoots in return, scooting her head into Harry's waiting hand.

"Where did you go?" She asks the crooning bird. Hedwig, of course, does not answer. Harry ponders this. It is a vast and large world outside the ill-kept edges of the Riddle Manor lot; she hopes Hedwig is making the most of it.

She continues to pet the owl, smiling down upon it affectionately. "You like it here too, don't you?" She whispers.

Hedwig tilts her head up with a trill.

"Yeah," Harry agrees. "Me too."

.

.

.

**6.**

Harry sees the Dark Lord so rarely he may as well be a wandering ghost haunting the house. He spoke of a connection between the two of them, and sometimes she'll sit in a dust-mottled room and try to find the thread that ties them together. She certainly can't predict where he is at all times, like he does her, but there is a hollowness when he leaves.

It's not there now, so he must be around somewhere.

Harry never goes into the dungeons, mostly for fear of what she may find down there. Voldemort had warned her once that she was not to wander into the basement, and she didn't need to be told twice.

Harry does not see much of the Dark Lord.

But she sees quite a bit of Tom Riddle.

It seems he is almost inescapable. He haunts her waking hours as a quiet form tucked away in the corners of her vision—sometimes she thinks she sees him darting past her into the yard; his small form curled up in the chair in the foyer; his large and curious gray eyes peering up at her as he crouches with her among the weeds in the garden.

She mulls about the house, plodding along sullenly, lost in her thoughts. Her feet lead her out to the yard, where fireflies have taken into the air like a thousand, scintillating lights. The summer air is warm and cloying, damp against her skin.

Out here in the stillness she crouches low, breathing deeply as she closes her eyes. Behind them Tom Riddle is there, in a moment not unlike this one. The orphanage yard is overrun with rampant weeds interspersed through cracks in the pavement. Scratched upon the surface of the concrete are long marks of colored chalk; remnants of games he will never play. He sits alone, surrounded by silence. He is so full of anger that it scares her sometimes—but he is equally as consumed by his loneliness. She thinks it was the combination of the two that created the black wraith wandering down the halls today.

She must doze off like that, as the scenes shift behind her eyes like diffused panels of sunlight; not coherent enough for her to recognize shapes or sounds, but suffused, thick and heavy with feeling: sorrow, lament, and desolation.

They are so strong in her that it stirs her from her daze, steeps deep within her soul.

Harry stands, and almost as if without conscious thought does she draw her wand and whisper into the silent air,

"Expecto Patronum,"

The blonde man falls to the floor in a crumpled heap, gasping against the soiled wood.

Lord Voldemort scowls, feeling, if possible, even more enraged after casting the Crucio than he had before. Pity. They almost always put him in better spirits.

"That is unacceptable, Lucius."

"Forgive m—me, my Lord…" His long hair lays lank and lifeless about his face, which has drawn gaunt with the duration of the curse. "But the Minister has grown paranoid—

"Did I ask for an explanation?" He hisses, smoldering rage inconsolable in his chest.

This is not a matter to be taken lightly. The prophecy is integral; he must retrieve it at all costs. As it is he can't even pinpoint its location. The thought makes him angrier than usual. His servants are useless in this endeavor, as the majority of them have fallen out of favor in the public eye, or worse, been convicted in a public trial. All but Lucius. Sly, slippery Lucius. Even he is proving to have little use.

"No," he replies, weak. "No, my Lord."

"Up," Voldemort commands.

His servant stands, shakily.

"You will return to the Ministry," he begins anew. "Imperio someone if you have to. Gain access to the room."

He bows low. "Yes, my Lord."

"And be sure not to rouse suspicion. Do not think you are the only hand I have in the Ministry. If I catch word of your endeavors—

A rustling, behind him. Through the open window, he can hear the long creak of the backdoor, the soft padding of small feet against the gravel path. He stills abruptly. He is intimately aware of the soft murmur of wind in her hair, the sweet sound of her breath, so loud in the intermittent silence of the drawing room. He is just as aware that as closely as he can hear her, she will be able to hear him.

"I assure you, you will not be pleased with the results," he finishes, voice distinctly quieter than before.

Lucius does not notice, bowing again. "Of course, my Lord. I will not fail you again."

He sneers. "See that you don't."

Lucius hears the dismissal in his tone, nodding and disapparating, leaving the Dark Lord alone in the sifting dust. He stares into the vacant room, before turning towards the windows. As he suspected, Harry is frolicking around in the yard, unaware anything is amiss. Well, perhaps not frolicking, but still just as wholly unaware of her surroundings. She is curled in the center of the yard, unmoving; the shivering glow of fireflies illuminate her profile in small catches of light, separating the parts from the whole. Like this, he can almost pretend she doesn't exist—not corporeally, anyway; not outside of the world in his dreams, the memories that haunt him even in his waking hours.

He watches her, silent, and asks himself once more why she is even here at all. Perhaps he should throw her into a dungeon, or lock her in a tower, or a Gringotts bank, as Tom Riddle had the rest of his Horcruxes. It felt like an oddly ill-fitting end. It had seemed only natural to find her on the platform, donning a false human skin, bringing her back to him.

She stirs, slow.

The part of him that belongs to her trembles beneath his ribs. He unwillingly feels her foreign emotions, spreading, a sharp scissile like acidulous glass upon him; grief, remorse, longing—all the things that he cannot understand.

The dress shifts as she stands. She has many more of them now, in bright prints and colors like sweetness and sunshine, but none hold her favor like the yellow sundress. The one he conjured for her: he is wholly unable to forget this fact each and every time he sees it. Even when he doesn't the thought stirs within him, as if a constant reminder that there is more to her that belongs to him than a simple sundress.

He does not hear her voice over the spell, even though the spell itself is soundless.

A white, marmoreal light blooms from the tip of her wand. Shivering stars dancing with the lightning bugs: a galaxy forms in the space around her. She is the indomitable center of its gravity. The spots of stars drift around her, before all the lights move in tandem, as if in preconcerted effort, and a glissade of luminous light that takes form in front of her.

It is as if, all at once, the very breath is stolen from him at the sight.

A Patronus.

Perhaps he should not be so surprised to see her conjure one. She has defeated him twice now, and while perhaps luck had a great deal to do with her victories it still is no easy endeavor. Yet the Patronus is a difficult charm to master—even grown wizards cannot conjure such a feat, including him.

The fawn nudges against her, as if in corporeal touch. A slight smile grows about her lips as she reaches a cautious hand.

How ironic that she so easily casts the only spell which the greatest sorcerer in the world cannot.

.

.

The cold light is like a balm upon her weary soul, washing away the sorrow and the sadness, if only for a little bit. They will be back, she knows this intimately, but for now the blinding presence beside her seems to burn from inside her heart, warming her to her toes.

She gazes sightlessly into the constellations of her fawn; her hand stills, and suddenly something compels her to turn around. Her attention is drawn towards a window above, where a dark figure stands unmoving in the shadows.

She blinks, and he is gone.

.

.

.

** 22.**

Her eyes turn to him, so bright and wide. They consume everything: space, time, the gravity beneath them and between them. They will ruin him, he knows.

It is with no small amount of weariness that he takes this moment to privately admit to himself what he knew all along: he loves her. And what great, regrettable irony it is. He loves her as certain dark things are to be loved, in secret, in the spaces between shadow and soul. She will ruin him. But undoubtedly he has already ruined her.

He should break his gaze away. But it as if nothing in her is extinguished nor forgotten. Her expression is like night: calm, constellated. And yet, like always, when those luminescent eyes turn to him something endless draws in them.

She slips her hand into his. Small and warm.

She tugs—she is leading him somewhere. He should not follow, but he indulges her. His gaze is transfixed into the knit of their fingers. His, long and pale and skeletal; hers, small, trim, smudged slightly with both dirt and vitality alike. They look as if they have seen sunshine: grass, earth, and sky. Her fingertips are painted haphazardly in mismatched colors, as if she couldn't decide which she liked best and decided on them all.

They spill out into the yard, a white grayscale light burns the earth into complacency, and in the watery sunshine he cannot reconcile anything in his gaze from what he remembers. Nagini slithers between his feet and into the grass, making for the tall and overgrown rose bushes. It appears as if the contents of many people's gardens have found their way into the space behind the mansion—or, more likely, the stolencontents of other people's gardens. He tries to imagine Harry scampering around the yards of the muggle neighbors, pillaging potted pants and uprooting bushes as he tortures innocents in the mansion's hollowed halls.

He should steal his hand away once more. There are people to see, prisoners to torture, matters to attend to.

All of it seems so very insignificant when she turns to him, that unending look in her eyes.

"Isn't it beautiful?" She says, breathlessly, and he agrees, but he is not looking at the garden.

"You've kept yourself busy," he finds himself replying, though it is impossible not to give her every inch of his attention. She burns bright and ephemeral in the wintry light, every particle of sun and sound draws into her as if compelled by a foreign force: he is no exception.

She nods absently, moving further into the wonderland. "What do you know of flowers?" She asks, guiding him through the sweet efflorescence.

"Nothing remarkable," he answers, and continues to let her draw him into the garden.

"Oh," she looks unreasonably sad to know that there are, indeed, things on this earth of which he does not possess intimate knowledge of.

"Well," she begins again; her hand has not left his, and she swings them lightly, almost absentmindedly, as she wanders about the flowers. "I don't know much either… but I figured it's very hard to go wrong with flowers."

She stops quite suddenly. "You don't mind… do you?" She asks, tentative, and her eyes are steadfastly fixed away from him.

"The Manor is yours to do what you wish," he answers at great length. All but the dungeons, goes unsaid. A conflicted look passes her face at the mention of the other parts of his life.

"Thank you," she replies, but it is distant and dispirited. He should not care so greatly on her viscous and ever-changing emotions—he finds himself disquieted anyway, displeased with the idea of somehow upsetting her.

Love, he thinks. It must be this: the knot in his chest, the awful feeling that grows and festers in his stomach. If he had known that Dumbledore's greatest weapon was more or less a stomach ulcer he would have invested less time in attempting to destroy the girl in front of him and more into a cure for a stomachache.

Her hand slips out of his, and she wanders into the forest of flowers. He doesn't quite catch her expression: he doesn't need to. Her conflicted emotions wash over him as if caught in the wind.

But he knows, in his heart, that this ailment he suffers from cannot be cured by a simple potion.

Harry spins around, regarding him. "What are you thinking of?" Her eyes linger on his, searchingly.

What is he to say? It seems so horribly ironic—everything about this.

The power the dark lord knows not.

The dark lord appraises her. "Nothing of consequence," he answers at length.

Her eyes are quiet and sad, as if to show the expression for the both of them. He says this, but she will always know it's a lie. The desperation, anger, resignation; they must all be very plain for her to see, in delitecent places that cannot be hidden from her.

"You're thinking about the prophecy." But this is not a question. Her gaze lowers, almost guiltily. But that is ridiculous; what does she have to be guilty for? There is only one person responsible for putting those events in motion standing in this garden, and is not her.

Had he not come to her on that unremarkable autumn night, they would not be faced with this doomed, preclusive ending.

But had he not come to her on that unremarkable autumn night, they would not be where they are now.

The world is so still around her, as she draws closer, the indomitable force of this diminutive universe. Violescent flowers curl around them: an unmoving portrait of color and shadow. He does not have eyes for any of it. But then, there appears to be only one thing on this earth he has ever had eyes for.

"It's not true," she denies, drawing his attention back to the matter at hand. "I won't let it be true."

Her austere and unrepentant promise is touching, if not unnecessary and ultimately irrelevant. He would not have let it happen, anyway. It confuses him, if anything. Why would he want to destroy such a precious part of his soul? He finds quiet comfort in the endless tenderness in her gaze. He finds himself incapable of causing her harm, and his sentiment is shared. And anyway, Harry couldn't even hurt a fly—not because she wouldn't want to, but because she wouldn't even know how. He's fairly sure the most dangerous spell she knows is bombarda.

They both agree to refuse it.

Yet there is an inevitable sorrow that has overtaken him.

She takes his hand quite suddenly, slipping nimble fingers into his. Her wand is held between them, and she raises their entwined hands until it is settled before her eyes. Though it is not his wand, it feels familiar: like walking through a familiar door into an unfamiliar room, this wand reminds him so much of his own. However there is a sweetness to it that could never be found in the yew wood of his.

She does not take her eyes off of his. "Expecto Patronum,"

His eyes widen. Magic rushes from their joined fingers in a brilliant white light. It erupts between them, like a shooting star, and drifts around them like thousands of glowing paper lanterns. He feels something warm and beautiful settle into his heart—something so glorious he could never have possibly conjured it on his own.

A fawn made from glass and stars nuzzles lightly against his other hand. He looks down upon it, surprised. It's not corporeal, and yet he feels as if he can feel its touch.

Her gaze lowers towards it, and she holds out a hand for the patronus to sniff, smiling slightly.

"It feels so wonderful, doesn't it?" She whispers, so softly, as if not to intrude upon the moment.

"Yes," he replies, distant, transfixed upon it. Its white light chases away everything else, until nothing remains but serein stars and an unending warmth.

She disregards the fawn, leaning close to rest against his chest. Her hand still covers his, so stark against the deadly pale of his skin. Brother wands, he is reminded. It sings in response to his touch. Her lashes flutter against his neck, and then she is pulling him down to catch his lips with her own.

And the Dark Lord will mark her as his equal,

His other hand draws upwards to the fringe of her hair, brushing lightly against the infamous lightning scar. She lowers the wand; the little universe disperses. They both ignore the dwindling lights; her shivering hands reach up to him, and something even more enchanting than her spell seems to make its own magic between them. Something more enchanting—and infinitely more deadly.

Equals? He pulls her closer, and the garden disappears into the dark gloom of his bedroom.

The Dark Lord will mark her as his own.

And he has always been very possessive—very protective—of what's his.

.

.

.

**7\. **

Harry has never had so much freedom in her life. The summer passes in starry nights and long, warm afternoons; insignificant moments in time spent lazing in the grass with Nagini, listening to the bird songs, and occasionally, silent spaces in the library, with only the Dark Lord for company. She expected him to be significantly worse company. As it is, he is quiet, but not obtrusive. Perhaps a little disengaged, but she didn't expect him to converse with her, let alone allow her to live in his manor for the summer.

She writes to her friends cautiously and tactfully; she mentions to Hermione that she has made a muggle friend, and she is staying the summer at their house in Blackburn. Hermione is, predictably, quite curious at that. Harry hedges her off, saying something about long ago playdates with a muggle child her age. She says the same to Ron, who is summarily less interested about muggle boys and muggle houses.

To the Dursely's, she simply pens down a brief excuse: She will not be staying on Privet Dr. this summer, thank you.

Unsurprisingly, they do not reply.

Still, it is by far the best summer she has ever had. Harry is not sure she's ever had such freedom; such guileless worry for such a significant amount of time. And she has never had such… odd company, either.

But perhaps the strangest part of the whole summer is: she's beginning to… like him.

He's the murderer of her parents, of countless people. He's probably responsible for the deaths of even more than that. Hell, he's tried to killher on multiple occasions.

And yet, she does not shy away from the brief, almost unnoticeable touches he leaves upon her skin, from his presence in a darkened room, from his cloaked figure engaged in a large tome at the dining table. Even with people she is somewhat familiar with—other Gryffindors, distant faces from other houses that she vaguely recalls—she would never allow them into her space the way she does him. For the most part, she rarely notices. This in and of itself is odd; the small bubble of security she keeps around herself is a constant presence whenever she is in the company of others. Even Ron and Hermione.

But the dark lord will wander near her; place a hand upon her shoulder, cool, long fingers draping down her arm. That same hand, pressed to the small of her back as he leads her into a dark hallway. Tapping an illicit rhythm upon the desk beside her. Picking stray ferns out of her hair when she wanders into the library after an afternoon in the wilds outside.

A small collection of touches she hadn't acknowledged until now.

Harry joins the dark lord in his study that evening, even though there is nothing she would like less than an afternoon whittled away indoors with a droll text in hand. She's no Hermione, that's for sure.

She enters the room and an electricity runs through her skin; a current that tingles almost unpleasantly down her spine. Harry pauses at the threshold, wary, peering into the library with a sudden apprehension. The dark lord is where she expected; draped upon a large velvet sofa, inky darkness cloaked around him.

Something cold settles in her stomach at the feel of him, and she knows quite suddenly that he has been drenched in the dark arts for the better part of the day, for it clings, besotted, to his very skin like a tangible pestilence.

This does not deter her; if anything, it spurs her forward more. She grabs for the first book she finds—an encyclopedia on medieval torture hexes—and plants herself, determined, upon the seat next to him.

He does not look up.

She bites her lip, and then consciously draws her legs beneath her. The movement tilts her slightly, and she shifts until she is right next to him, until she can feel the warmth of his skin beneath his robes.

The dark lord stiffens, and Harry stays very still.

There is a great likelihood that Lord Voldemort will throw her off. Perhaps more likely, simply remove himself from the couch and walk away from her. But there is a pleasant warmth that grows between them in the interim of a simple touch, and she has a feeling he will not want to let it go.

He doesn't.

The dark lord flips a page in his book. He does not look up, nor does he acknowledge that she is there at all. Still, Harry counts this as a win.

She allows herself a small, triumphant grin, before she splits the spine of her book. Immediately she cringes. The title was not misleading—it really is just a giant encyclopedia on horrific and possibly impossible things to do to a fellow human. There are also, even, some for small pets.

"I had not realized you had such a budding fascination on archaic torture devices."

She flushes. "I…"

Ah.

She snaps it shut before it can revolt her further. His narrow, dark eyes turn towards her; they are devoid of any significant evil, though she can still feel it crawling amongst his skin. It is strange to see and remember once more that this evil is not directed towards her. That, it appears, it will never again turn its ire towards Harry Potter.

She bites her lip deeply enough to draw blood, and slips her hand into his before her bravery can desert her. He grows still beside her.

"You feel cold," she says, in a small voice, not looking at him. "And dark."

Lord Voldemort is inscrutable.

"Perhaps that is not so strange a thing," he allows, after some time. "I am the dark lord."

But not always.

The dark lord would not allow a little girl to traipse through his manor for the summer: he would not humor her and hold her hand when she pulls their fingers together; he would not conjure a dress, a bed, and a room; he would not whisper sleep into her ear on the nights when it eludes her.

There is a man in there that is not the dark lord— there is a man in there that can cause great evils all the same, hiding in that same skin.

Harry does not reply.

I know, she thinks, insensibly saddened. It is so very difficult to connect the quiet man next to her to the horrific monster that had emerged out of a cauldron in a decrepit graveyard. It's been months in his company and she's still rather incapable of it.

"What are you reading?" She says instead, peering curiously over his shoulder.

There are no moving pictures, so automatically she finds it boring, and the text is so small she squints to make it out—and when she does, finds it's not in any language she understands.

"A treatise on the goblin wars of 1712." He answers, as if this is simple, light afternoon reading.

She makes an ambiguous noise that is neither understanding nor disapproval, and leans her head against his shoulder, under the pretense of reading along with him. He stiffens again, but does not move to pull away. Voldemort does not appear to have any overt or considerable reaction to this—outwardly, anyway. But she can feel a certain contentment settle inside her; one that is not quite hers and not quite his. A mix of both.

He doesn't release her hand, even as it warms the deathly cold of his skin; lets her play with their intertwined hands as she peers down upon them, thumbing against him and pressing their index fingers together. His hands are so much larger than her own; her finger looks so small in comparison to his. The skin is a creamy white, without a single imperfection. She is reminded of how it came to be in the first place. How could something so beautiful come from something so dark?

He flips another page; the only sound in the silent room.

True to form the book does indeed appear to be about goblins. She didn't know there was anything to learn about them other than the fact they are staunch capitalists, like the rest of society, but with far more gold.

"Is it interesting?" She whispers, very curious. What she reads seems at least marginally informative, but also incredibly bland.

"Somewhat," is his uneager response. She smiles very slowly at that. Even the great Dark Lord is not enthused with an irritating, banal read.

"I don't like history. Professor Binns makes everything sound a lot more boring than it probably is," she relays, a tone of complaint to her voice. He moves ever so slightly, and when she peers upwards she marvels at the tiny, almost unremarkable smile upon his lips.

"Yes, I imagine he still retains his position as the most monumentally boring professor in that school."

"Oh?" She smirks. "Did the great Tom Riddle fall asleep in his class? You can tell me, I promise to keep it a secret."

He scoffs. "I was never so inattentive to my studies." Which probably means 'yes but I will never admit it'.

She makes an unconvincing noise, before returning her attention to his book. "What's so great about goblins, anyway?"

"They are very intelligent, fascinating creatures; it is very unwise to underestimate them." He returns, sounding amused.

She racks her brain for anything regarding the severe little creatures. "If they were so smart," she begins, loftily, "than why did they take that treaty with the vampires?"

For a brief moment, his grip tightens in hers, and then he is explaining in detail just why goblins are such an interesting subject. He is a far better teacher than Professor Binns, that's for sure. She's struck with an image of Tom Riddle, a bit older than the one in the diary, lecturing in front of a class of eager students. She imagines that it's almost entirely made up of girls, who all stare at him with total adoration. The thought makes her giggle.

He pauses. "Is something funny about the deaths of hundreds of eastern European goblins?"

"No," she shakes her head very quickly, still fighting off a smile. "Sorry—but what about the goblins in Russia? They didn't get hurt?"

He appears to be somewhat miffed by such a blatant interruption, but carries on without remark. "Well, they were far better prepared…"

It's not as if he is a bad teacher—if anything, she has established that he's quite good at it. But this does not stop her from growing drowsy with the setting sun, his smooth voice guiding her into dreams.

By the time he has concluded the war, she is fast asleep upon his shoulder.

.

.

He refuses to carry her.

She is far past the age to be carried to bed. He brushes wayward hair out of her face; she is far too old to be carried to bed, yet juvenescence is still so warm upon her skin, the flutter of her lashes, her lips as they move silently, lost in dreams. With an absent wave of his hand, she is lifted off the couch, into his arms.

He refuses—but he does it anyway.

Her bed is a rat's nest of pillows and blankets, strewn about as if seized by a storm. He sighs, and he waves that away too, until all the pillows return to their home, and the blankets have straightened themselves out. He lays her upon them, drawing the line at tucking her in. Her hair slips through his fingers like water—for once, not untamed and inescapable—and her head tilts into the pillow, falling into whatever wonderland has arisen behind her eyes.

"_Tom,_" she murmurs, and he looks down upon her with surprise. She is fast asleep.

How very curious.

His fingers come to linger upon the little scar atop her head; and if he stays for longer than needed, it is only to insure no nightmares plague her sleep tonight.


	2. i - ii

**.**

**PART I**

.

.

**34.**

Against all logic and rational thought, Harry leaps between him and the boy, blocking him from sight.

"Potter," He narrows his eyes, his voice low and dangerous.

It appears to elicit some modicum of response; she bites her lip, looking at least slightly chastised, as if realizing exactly what kind of position she's put herself in. But then something flinty replaces it—something that stirs within him great anxiety.

"Voldemort," She responds, curtly, and it is as if a steel curtain has drawn between them. She has never addressed him as Lord Voldemort before, never acknowledging him as anything else but Tom, _her _Tom—

_("Tom," She says, as he lowers his mouth to the indent of her hip, "Tom," She says, when she tucks her hand into his, staring up into a vast and anticipatory sky, "Tom," When she leans over him when she thinks he's fast asleep)_

and the distance he feels at the name seems endless.

Against all reason, he finds he second guesses himself.

There is no reason to: the insipid girl has chosen her side, clearly, and if she would follow the whims of a dead man to her grave than that is her own folly. It should not weigh so heavily on his mind—it should not matter at all, whether she decides to become his opposition.

He tilts his head. Behind her, the Malfoy spawn is unmoving. Good. He hopes he's dead—it would surely prove her a lesson indeed.

There is no ultimatum: there is only death for those that oppose the Dark Lord.

"I will only ask you once," he begins, quiet and controlled. "Step aside."

There will be only death for her, too, if she stands in his way.

"He did what you wanted!" She returns, ignoring the coiling rage that is so heady in his gaze.

"He failed me!" The dark lord denies, stalking forward.

"He's _dead_!" She shouts, and her voice wavers, a shadow of the hurt he can feel beneath his own ribs as if it is his own emotions that draw it forth. "Dumbledore is dead! What more could you possibly want?"

She doesn't understand. She will never understand.

He draws his wand.

"It doesn't have to be this way," she shakes her head, inching closer, suddenly incapable of keeping her safe distance. Her eyes, wide and grave and so full of fear and fury, lower into something infinitely more dangerous—imploring and virescent, like the antebellum of a war he does not wish to start.

"It does," he replies, hollow. The white wand she had thought would never turn to her again now centers upon her pallid face, unwavering.

She takes another step. "Please," She says, and he flinches violently at the word. Normally the dark lord finds the sight of his enemies begging in front of him quite alluring—but as always, she is the insurmountable exception to every rule he has.

"Step aside," He commands again, and it does not escape him that he had said those same words a life time ago, directed towards a strikingly similar woman; a gauntlet of fiery hair draped across her shoulders, the distinct, imploring downward turn of her mouth, the fear and devastation and _determination _that would not leave those virulent eyes. Even in death they had stared at him, lifeless and haunting and brave.

Harry's eyes dart quickly to the side, but she does not turn her head. Nor does she step aside. She, to his complete lack of surprise, does not move and stands her ground.

"You don't have to do this," She whispers, low and grave. Her eyes are very wide and it should not pain him so much to see fear in them. She seems to have come to the conclusion that he can and will strike her down if she doesn't comply. He wishes he could share her conviction.

"Please," She says again, nothing but a murmur of breath.

_Don't do this to me, _She does not say, but he hears it all the same.

He keeps a steady hand.

.

.

.

**8.**

For the first time in years, she is not trembling in excitement at the idea of returning to school.

Even though summer is at its close, the unending heat remains as a hot blanket over the manor. Voldemort does finally relent and teach her the cooling charm. She uses it prolifically—it may actually be her favorite charm yet.

The little touches have grown in number and duration, to the point she has once again forgotten their existence. It seems entirely natural to lean against him and read; science fiction, mostly, so nothing he considers legitimate. As if the adventures of the smarmy space smuggler Han Solo are beneath him, or worth even a small modicum of his attention. She doesn't mind his derisive scorn at her choice in reading material; she enjoys the time far too much.

In her unending spare time she learns to knit (that is a fail), learns to crochet (that is even worse) and has actually accomplished her summer reading. She may actually pass History of Magic this year.

The Dark Lord is gone far more often than he is home—and when did she start thinking of Riddle Manor as home?—and when he is, he appears greatly distracted. Harry wonders what he's up to; than she wonders if she truly wants to know. Probably not.

Harry writes to Hermione a few more times. First to ask her for advice on how to knit in a straight line, and then just for general conversation. Her bookish friend is still very curious about her summer, but Harry has learned the art of evasive answers, and distracts or deters every effort she makes. When it becomes clear that Harry is never going to be able to knit anything even approaching legitimate, Hermione suggests picking up a less dexterous, but still just as artistic hobby. Unfortunately, Harry is not any better at taking good photos than she is at knitting in a straight line. Hermione insists that every photo she takes is good and she is using her 'abstract, artistic liberties'—whatever that means. She lazes for long hours with Nagini, who curls on her bed at night like an enormous, scaly dog and wraps around her shoulders like a shawl when it becomes too cold for her reptilian body.

And then, it is finally time for her to return.

It feels so strange to think their little space in time is coming to a close. What will she do? Will she stay here again for Yule? And onwards, to the next summer break? She doesn't want this to be the last time she relaxes in the sunlight of Riddle Manor's dining room, having breakfast with the Dark Lord, a certain equanimity strung between them.

She spends the whole morning in a state of great distress, picking at her food halfheartedly and eating very little of it.

He knows, of course. As if she could possibly hide anything from him, ever.

After perhaps an eternity of her fidgeting, he finishes, putting his silverware down with some kind of great finality. Her heart seizes.

"Harry—" he starts, at the same time she does.

"You'll write to me, right?" Comes out of her mouth before she can grab it, and her eyes widen in horror. But not horror and fear—horror and _total mortification_. Oh Merlin. Did she just ask Lord Voldemort to write letters to her?

He pauses, regarding her deeply. She wants to melt into the ground and die there.

"If you wish," he answers at length, noncommittal and unreadable.

She feels as if her flush is so violent it will actually burn her cheeks. She nods silently, deciding it is far better for her to just keep quiet, before she can embarrass herself further.

He stands then, drawing close. She peers up at him as he pulls something from his robes. It is a necklace; a piece of exiguous chain, really, which wraps tightly around an isabelline, vaguely rhombus shaped stone. It drops from his hands, swinging in the sunlight as a scintillating light, and then he is slipping it over her head. It sits perfectly on her chest, and she looks down at it with deep curiosity.

Fortunately, he explains before she has to run the risk of embarrassing herself further.

"A portkey," he says, but he is not looking at it, rather, staring at her deeply. "It will return you here, regardless of where you are."

Something burns intensely in her chest: a deep affection.

"Thank you," she whispers, clasping her hands around it as if it is a priceless possession. She catches his gaze, reticent. "What do I say to activate it?"

His eyes are still upon her, burning crimson, and she thinks she sees a flicker of hesitation, before it settles once more into impassivity.

"_Home_."

**20.**

He is not ready to see her there, curled into her dreams.

Her hair splays upon the pillow like water, limp rivulets pouring down the side of the paisley print couch. One luxurious stretch of arm dangles off the edge, listless. He first notices the bruises upon her shins, small splotches in an otherwise undisturbed expanse of milky skin. The marks of youth, no doubt, of frolicking in meadows or adventuring between the trees. His second observation is a similar mark beneath the slip of her collar. Similar, and yet strikingly alarming. It is in the shape of a mouth, and there are more that crawl where he cannot see them, slipping beneath the hem of her dress.

He is not ready to see her there. He is not ready for the tidal wave of inexplicable emotions that rise within him at the sight of that mark, at its very existence; anger, disgust, repulsion, _horror_—

Guilt.

Had he not sworn to protect this girl from all who wished to do her harm? He had made that intimate promise years before he'd met her, had always known it would be the hardest promise he would ever strive to keep. The task became even more monumentally difficult when he had first laid eyes upon her and realized he would have to keep her out of his sight for the entire tenure of her years at Hogwarts, lest he be plagued by a woman with strikingly similar features.

There were more than a few close calls; missed moments where he could have very well failed. One, perhaps, for every year she had attended the school.

He wonders if he has well and truly failed this time.

For why else would she be here, sleeping so comfortably in the dark lord's manor, sprawled upon a striped sofa in a warm, airless room, with the mark of Lord Voldemort's mouth upon her chest?

He can barely keep the utter revulsion off his face, at the idea of it, at what it _means_.

How could he have let this happen to her? To Lily's daughter? She is so young yet, still just a girl.

His presence does not go unnoticed; she stirs, reluctant, pulled from her dreams by an unknown force.

Her gaze drifts towards him—expression flitters over her face, too quick for him to catch, before she is staring up at him with something close to resignation.

"Professor," she says, sitting up slowly.

"Miss Potter," he intones, as if the very words are poisonous.

She looks up at him curiously, and it comes upon him that it is _he _who is out of place in this dusty sitting room. It is clearly not her—as accustomed to her surroundings as she appears to be. She slips her fallen shoe back onto her bare foot, resting both upon the ground. One hand almost absentmindedly rubs against the side of the couch; a familiar gesture.

He swallows, and finds the words to say, "You are expected in the drawing room."

"Oh," she says, sitting up further. Her appraisal of him is wary at best, looking to him as if she expects a larger reaction from him.

She isn't wrong to.

"I—I should go, then," her hand draws up to press lightly against the hollow of her throat, and it is then that he realizes he has been staring at the mark for an immodest amount of time. There is a distant flush to her cheeks.

She pivots, and descends into the hallway: a fiery light in the gloom.

Harry presses her fingers into her neck, again, and feels the tenderness there and knows he left a mark. It is small, but conspicuous still if she does not consciously make an effort to cover it. She peers down, and lopes a finger into the collar of her dress. There are at least a dozen more, trotting down her chest and down to—

It feels hot, suddenly, and her skin tingles all over as she presses just a bit harder. She cannot help but remember the act which had created the mark—and the person behind it. The hot, wet mouth against the intimate expanse of skin, the teeth that drew up the column of her neck. A shiver runs through her, and she drops her hand.

She wants to feel it again.

"You wanted to see me?" She steps through a panel of warm sunlight as she crosses the room. Lord Voldemort takes the inopportune moment to look up, catching sight of her bathed in sunset. His heart shudders involuntarily. He has never felt this way before—about anything or anyone. Not immortality, not power, not even magic.

He holds aloft a fine slip of parchment between narrow, elegant fingers.

Harry's eyes move to the bird resting above his shoulder, perched upon the woodwork of his ornate chair. Hedwig trills at her, and she smiles indulgently as she walks toward him.

As she nears, she can make out a long scrawling list down the page.

She takes it from him, blinking at the sight.

"Oh," She says, as she reads down the list of school supplies for her sixth year. It's a Hogwarts letter, addressed to _Harriett Rose Potter, Riddle Manor, Little Hangleton. _

Then her eyes widen in fear. "But," her eyes dart between the dark lord and the letter. "How do they—

Voldemort waves her off. "The letters are spelled and drawn by a magical quill; they are never seen until they're delivered."

Her relief is evident; she flops into one of the chairs and stretches her legs, wasting no time in divesting the letter of its envelope. She sits as if it is not at all remiss to see her stretched languidly upon it, as if she owns it, as if she belongs here. He likes the thought: she does belong here. More importantly, she belongs with him.

His thoughts darken.

And then darken further when his gaze once again leaves his paperwork and returns to the girl, who is lazily flicking through the list of school requirements, an absent hand rubbing at the base of her neck, just above her pendant, pressing at the mark that is so stark against her skin.

He's not sure why that is his undoing; he has many marks on her, many claims to her, one of which is prevalent and infamous upon her forehead. Even deeper still, the part of his soul that resides in her. But he is a possessive creature by nature; Tom Riddle has always obsessed over the care of his horcruxes, of his prized possessions. Lord Voldemort is no different.

"It's as if you intentionally mean to become an unending distraction," He stands suddenly, and she looks up, confused.

The confusion fades to mortification and a secret thrill as he looms over her.

She flushes, "I—I didn't mean to—" It is a very pretty color upon her. He wants to see how far he can make it go down.

He hovers over her and she meets his lips with a willingness that rather surprises him. She is always so very docile; delightfully shy. Even in the warmth of her mouth he feels as if he could taste it. He pulls her up to stand, but just as swiftly spins her around to splay her across his desk. Papers fly everywhere. Her aggravating owl hoots indignantly, before taking off for the window. Good riddance. She ignores all of this; her hands wind against him, trail up his arms, skitter down his neck. Her mouth burns hot against his own, insistent.

He releases her then, and her wide irises flutter open, so close to his own; they are dark along the edges, before they burn into an almost unnaturally bright, radioactive green, and after, in the small corners along the pupil, a ringed halo bleeds russet red; another part of him marred upon her. He keeps her gaze as he straightens, one hand sliding from her hip to slide in against the side of her thigh and bring it towards him. The hem of her dress shifts down her leg, pooling at her waist. Her cheeks flush a brilliant color, a quiet gasp escapes her; dusky shadows obscure the most intimate part of her, fabric flirting along the edges. He descends upon the hollow of her knee, the dips upon the little bones, the shadows that gather around them. Her breath shakes in her chest, and she trembles so beautifully when his mouth moves up her thigh.

Her head is tossed to the side, as if the sight of him is too much to bear; the mane of fire sprawls beneath her, color so violent against the whiteness of parchment. He wants to remember this forever with the clarity of a pensieve, the way her lashes flutter against her cheeks and her mouth, abused by his own, gasps for breath. He lowers himself down her leg, beneath the hem of fabric, where her scent is intoxicating.

She almost sits upright, eyes widening in surprise. "Wait—Tom, what are you—"

But he ignores her, and descends. Harry cries aloud, shuddering apart beneath his hands as he licks into her. The quietness of her breath, uneven and ragged, is music to his ears. And when one hand draws closer, _into _her, she arches her back with a whimper that darkens his eyes. She is already so wet for him; it doesn't take long until her cries are overwhelming in the empty room.

When he stands again, he sees an arm thrown over her eyes, a deep flush staining her cheeks as her chest heaves deeply. She looks ruined. She looks _owned_.

The thought breaks the last of his patience.

He leans down to claim what's his.

**9.**

Harry glares sullenly out the window, twirling her wand halfheartedly as she gazes out at the dreary atmosphere. The day is hot, sticky, and miserable—and unlike Riddle Manor, Privet Drive is not equipped with wards powerful enough to block out the Ministry's monitoring wards, so she cannot even attempt to cast the cooling charm.

It feels so surreal, being back here. It's as if she dreamed the whole summer up.

Tom had deposited her back into purgatory earlier that week, insisting that she remain here for the last few days of summer before term starts. Harry sees the validity in his reasoning; she can't exactly just show up at the Hogwarts Express, dark lord in tow. It's better to just play it safe and return to the Dursley's. It makes sense. But this doesn't mean she has to like it.

As her gaze flickers out into the world outside, she finds herself almost believing it. After all, what would the Dark Lord want with her? He's made it his life's work to kill her… and, and what? Now they're…

Harry's stomach curls.

Now they're—well, whatever they are.

She bursts out of the house, walking briskly down the street, intent on letting her feet take her wherever they want to wander. She wants to believe that it's all _not_ a dream; that it happened, that she didn't make it up.

Her hands find themselves winding around the pendant upon her neck, as if willing herself to remember that it all happened. She has a pendant, and an almost unnoticeable scar upon her wrist—and the quiet memory of warm light as it filters through the stained windows of the library, the smell of old parchment, the rhythmic sound of shifting paper, as Voldemort turns another page.

Her feet carry her towards an empty playground, and the familiar shapes and sounds draw her into a memory that isn't hers, but one she identifies with all the same. Tom Riddle used to stand just where she is, on the fringes, gazing longingly at all the games he is not a part of. Harriet Potter did the same, ordered out of sight, never allowed to play games with Dudley or his friends—even if Dudley's friends normally liked her better anyway.

On the subject of Dudley, she looks up at the familiar sound of his voice. He is bullying some little kid into giving him his popsicle. Harry has no idea why Dudley would want a half-eaten popsicle, but then, when does anything about Dudley make sense?

"Picking on children are we?" She scowls at him, stepping towards them just as the little boy begins to cry. Her eyes soften at him, and she deliberately steps in between them. In the interim, the child sees his opportunity to escape and darts off. Harry narrows her eyes at her cousin. "Three against a six year-old—sounds like a fair fight."

Dudley's face flushes up in indignation. "Oh, look what the cat dragged in. Finally stopped moping around, have you?"

"Big D, is that your cousin?" Exclaims one of his friends, looking gobsmacked.

"She's a real bird," remarks the other.

"Yeah, when did that happen?"

"Big D?" She snorts, ignoring them both. "Cool name—but to me, you'll always be Ikkle Duddicums—

"Shut up!" He erupts, even as his friends snicker behind him. He rounds on her, and she stands up immediately, wand pointed in front of her.

The boys behind him laugh, but Dudley's face flickers with fear and recognition. Soon enough it returns to its normal sneer. "Oooh, now you're trying to act tough, Potter? Not so tough in your bed, are you?"

She blinks at him, frowning.

"Crying in you sleep, are you?" He mimics tears, pretending to faint. "_Oh, Tom_—who's Tom, huh? You're little boy toy—

She doesn't bother with her wand this time, she rears back and throws a left hook dead center. A part of her is wondering what he would do if he realized just who he was making fun of. The rest of her is utterly furious at that he'd even joke about it. As if Dudley knew a thing about suffering. Real fury, livid and hot, burns within her—more than she's ever felt before.

She points her wand at him, hand shaking with the intensity of her anger. She knows the spell. It's on the back of her tongue, whispering in her mind. Distantly she wonders if she's changed somehow, from her time with him. Her ire is almost uncontrollable. Hell. Of course it's changed her; she would have never even considered using an unforgiveable on her cousin before. This should concern her greatly, but she doesn't dwell on it now.

Harry takes a deep breath, resolutely lowering her wand.

"You're not even worth it," she says to him, coldly.

He leaps up at that, lunging for her. "You little—

She darts out of the way, about to go for another fist to his face when the air dramatically drops in temperature. Ice runs down her back, and belatedly she notices the sky has gone dark. The sticky summer has fled, leaving a bitter cold.

Harry seizes up.

She knows this coldness.

Dudley's friends scream and run in terror, and she tilts her head up slowly to see the clouds have begun to brew ominously, intermittent between the dreary gray are desolate streaks of black. Their cries are undeniable. She whips back around to Dudley, who has frozen in terror. She kicks him.

"Run!"

They sprint out of the open, making for the cover of an overpass a couple yards away. Rain has come with the advent of the clouds, bring a torrential downpour with it. They burst into the tunnel under the road, soaked and out of breath. She looks down at herself; her nike's are ruined, and so is her dress. Fortunately, it is striped red and white thing, not her beloved yellow sundress. Dudley is whimpering beside her, cowering from everything and holding onto the wall. Typical.

She greedily heaves in air, smoothing her soaking hair out of her face. Her contacts burn in her eyes like she's gotten dirty water into them.

The rain, combined with the unnatural cold, makes all the small hairs on her arms stand, and she suppresses a shiver. The cold is so much worse than usual because she is so unused to it, what with it being one of the hottest summers on record.

She realizes it's not just her when the sewer water beneath her begins to ice over.

Harry turns around in horror to see that the dementors have followed them into the drainage tunnel.

Dudley shrieks, wrenching away from the wall only to slip and fall on his face. He whimpers, crawling his way backwards as they near. Harry takes a deep breath, ignoring him, and raises her wand.

"_Expecto Patronum_,"

A brilliant bright light sears the tunnel into white, and then cold and sorrow flees with the brightness. Her fawn chases them all the way back into the sky, until even the clouds have cleared away.

She wanders out of the tunnel, stunned, staring with wonder up at the sky. It's cleared now, and she can see the remains of her patronus as a shimmering light in the stratosphere, before it twinkles away.

"A very powerful patronus charm," appraises a voice from behind her.

She whirls around.

Her jaw drops. "Mrs. Figg?" She says, incredulously.

A moment later she is bodily dragging Dudley down Privet Drive, the little Mrs. Figg trotting by her side.

"Well, you can't have possibly expected them to just let you run around, what with what happened last year." Mrs. Figg explains, in the face of her shock. Apparently Mrs. Figg has been tasked with watching her. But—tasked by whom?

She swallows, unwilling to think about the events of last year. They seem so far away. "Yeah, I guess…"

"You've given us all a terrible shock, you know, running off." She whirls around disapprovingly. "Where were you, anyhow?"

"Staying with a friend," she sputters, unconvincingly. "What does it matter? I didn't know I wasn't supposed to leave!"

"Harry dear, did it not cross your mind that you might be in danger?"

Of course not, she thinks, hysterically. What with the fact she's _spent the entire summer i_n the same house as the Dark Lord Voldemort. Falling asleep on him, actually. Her pendant swings against her chest with every step she hauls Dudley with, as if reminding her that it really did happen.

She deposits Dudley with little fanfare, before storming out of the house, unwilling to have to face her insipid Muggle family. She's been feeling on edge and as if she's on some kind hair-trigger. Who knows what she'll do if she's made to try her patience with them. To make matters worse, the Ministry smacks her in the face—literally, with an owl and a letter.

She is expelled from Hogwarts.

Harry drops the letter in shock, letting it flutter to the ground and fall into a puddle. She sits numbly on the park bench on the corner of Privet drive, frozen, shivering wet, and feeling as if her life is crashing down on her. It's hard to remember that not even a week ago she had been the happiest and most content she's ever been in her entire life. So happy that the mere memory conjured the most powerful patronus she'd ever seen.

Can they really expel her from Hogwarts?

But of course they can—it's the Ministry. When have they ever been anything but useless, ineffectual, and a complete and total hindrance? Fudge has only spent the majority of the summer slandering Cedric, Dumbledore, and herself. Cedric's apparently 'gone round the bend' since the tournament, and doesn't know what he's saying. She is a lying little girl and Dumbledore is attempting to overthrow the Ministry. They are all so laughably wrong it almost makes her angry.

There is rustling in the bushes, suddenly.

"—those muggles are absolutely awful, honestly I'm she ran off."

"Don't say that, Nymphadora—

"_Don't call me Nymphadora—_

"The both of you! Stop arguing!"

Harry's head snaps up, and she blinks wildly at her surroundings. The street is silent, dark, and utterly miserable, without a soul in sight. But this is incorrect; three figures wander out of the after-rain mist. One of them she recognizes immediately.

"Remus!" She jumps to her, darting towards them and moving to envelope the werewolf in a hug. Remus returns it eagerly, squeezing her as if he thinks she'll disappear into thin air.

"Harriet Rose Potter," he says, shakily. "Don't you _ever_ do that to us again."

He takes a breath, pulling her away to look at her. "Do you have any idea how worried we've all been? When Mrs. Figg reported that you weren't at the Dursley's—

Harry blinks, alarmed. "Mrs. Figg?" She balks. Wait, is she spying on her now? What does Remus have to do with it?

"We were worried sick." Remus looks as if he's fighting off a lecture full of yelling. "Harry, you are in grave danger. This is not the time to be running around disappearing without telling anyone!"

Harry remains quiet, taking the reprimand with little fanfare and nothing but a contrary expression. A part of her wants to vehemently deny all of it; if anything, she is the last person who should be worrying about you-know-who.

"Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

She shakes her head.

Remus heaves a grand capitulation. "Very well. You'd best come with us. You'd better have a better explanation than that for Sirius—he's been worried out of his mind."

Harry swallows.

.

.

.

Harry does not know what to say.

The Order of the Phoenix.

They were Voldemort's greatest enemy in his first rise to power. The same organization her parents belonged to, that Neville's parents belonged to, that Remus and Sirius belong to—that the Weasley's are in as well. Everyone she loves is part of the Order—and this is the only thing stopping her from telling Tom that the Order has regrouped, and that Dumbledore has reinstated them, and is moving to fight against him.

She has never felt so torn. Every single person around this table is hell bent on seeing him dead—for real, this time, not just vanquished for an undisclosed amount of time. Not even four months ago she would have been in staunch agreement with this.

Now she simply feels cold and hollow, shaky, and fearful. Her hands are trembling.

"I don't understand." She says at length. "What has the Ministry of Magic got against me?"

Moody throws a wary glance around the room. "Show her," he grunts. "She'll find out soon enough."

Remus hands her the latest edition of the Prophet; it's gotten far worse than what she last saw of it. She's on the front cover as well. Wonderful.

"He's been attacking Dumbledore and the Diggory's as well. Fudge is using all of his powers, including his ties to the Daily Prophet to smear anyone who claims the Dark Lord has returned."

This is truly absurd. "Why?" She looks up, completely incredulous. "How could that possibly be effective?"

"When is the Ministry ever effective?" Sirius says under his breath. Harry fights off a smile.

"The Minister thinks Dumbledore is trying to usurp him and reinstate some kind of dictatorship."

Harry gapes at him. "That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard." She marvels, genuinely confounded by it. "Guy's lost his marbles."

"Yes that's exactly it," agrees Lupin, rubbing his temples. "Fudge isn't in his right mind. It's been twisted and warped with fear. Fear makes people do terrible things, Harry. Now the last time Voldemort gained power he almost destroyed everything we hold most dear,"

Harry's breath freezes in her throat.

"—Now he's returned, and I'm afraid the Minister will do anything to avoid facing that terrible truth."

"We think Voldemort wants to build up his army again." Sirius adds. Harry silently admits that he's most likely right. It would explain why he's been so distracted as of late. "Fourteen years ago he had huge numbers at his command—not just witches and wizards Harry, but all manner of Dark creatures. He's been recruiting heavily, and we've been attempting to do the same. But gathering followers isn't the only thing he's interested in—

Arthur Weasley coughs indelicately, and Sirius cuts himself off abruptly.

He casts a telling glance towards the others in the room, before looking back at her. "We believe Voldemort is after something," he begins, gravely.

"Sirius," Moody interrupts, voice low with warning.

"—something he didn't have last time—

"You mean like a weapon?" Harry asks, in a quiet whisper. She can't remember seeing anything like that in his house. But if he's recruiting his legions of dark creatures again, that would certainly explain where he's been disappearing to all summer.

"No, that's enough!" Cries Mrs. Weasley, loudly clapping her hands. "She's just a girl! You say much more and you might as well induct her into the Order straightaway."

Harry's eyes widen in terror at the very prospect. How exactly is she supposed to turn down that offer without explaining the fact that she's spent the last few months in his company? And doesn't really know if she's still against him?

"Oh don't be silly, Molly." Arthur laughs. "Of course we won't."

Harry fights to keep the relief off her face.

.

.

Sirius corners her some time after, when everyone has cleaned up after dinner and the crowds have dwindled. He hugs her abruptly and tightly, and she returns it, just as tight. She missed him so much. Sirius is the only thing she has left—the only remaining remnant of family she has.

Harry pauses, thoughtful.

Is that still true, though?

"Where have you been?" It's less of a question and more of a demand.

Harry struggles for words, guiltily looking into his distraught gaze, trying desperately to conjure up a convincing lie. "Well I—I mean—"

"We thought you had been killed," he interrupts fiercely. "We thought something had happened to you. That Voldemort had gotten to you—

"I'm fine!" She cuts him off with wide eyes. And she is. And Voldemort _has_ gotten to her. But she'd prefer him to never know that. "Perfectly fine!"

"That is not the point!" He hisses. "Harry, you could have been killed _so easily_, you don't understand…" he takes a shuddering breath. "I can't lose you, you know? You're all I've got left too, Harry."

"Sirius…" She swallows, wishing there was some way she could possibly reassure him without revealing everything. She's okay, and she has nothing to worry about. She's perfectly safe.

He smiles wanly at her, smoothing out her unruly bronze hair. "And I'm so glad to see you. It's been far too long."

She nods helplessly. "I know," she agrees, hoarsely. "And I'm so sorry Sirius, I never meant to make you all worry, I swear. I didn't—it's just, no one told me I had to stay put. No one told me anything… how was I supposed to know I couldn't go anywhere?"

Sirius sighs. "Yes, you're right. That was our fault; we should have warned you. We just didn't want to—make things worse for you. To have to know about all these things. We know this has all been very hard on you and Harry, you're truly still so young… just a girl… it's awful that already you have had so much put upon you…" He trails off, shaking his head. "At any rate, it's good to have you back, and safe."

And after a beat, "But, where did you go?"

She fidgets nervously. "Um, well—

"I think I might be able to answer that." Reveals a smooth voice to their left. Harry whirls around to see the young auror—Tonks—leaning against the wall with a sly smile.

"Can you now?" Sirius returns, coolly.

"Yep," she saunters over, with a wink towards Harry. "Y'see, Hermione _may_ have let it slip that Harry has made a friend…"

Harry's eyes grow wide in horror. Oh no.

Sirius' gaze grows conflicted. "A friend?" He repeats.

Nymphadora smiles at her. "Yeah, a muggle friend." And after a beat. "A _boy _muggle friend."

Harry doesn't even get the implications of that until Sirius is growing hysterical. "A boy? A boy friend? Harry, are you running off with boys? You are far too young for any of that, do you hear? You're not to be spending time with any boys, at least not alone!"

"I'm alone with Ron all the time," she points out, faintly. "And Fred and George."

"They're different," Sirius waves off. "Harry, boy's your age… well, they want certain things, you see. Boys are horrible, vile creatures. And they are only going to take advantage of you—

"Oh lighten up, Sirius!" Tonks enthuses, throwing an arm around Harry. Harry can't even begin to make sense of any of this, it is all so completely, horrendously wrong. First of al, she would never consider Voldemort her 'friend'. Second, he is not a boy. And he's not even close to her age. And—she flushes. And they are certainly not doing _that._ This is all one huge, mortifyingly embarrassing misunderstanding which, fortunately, only appears to be working in her favor.

"Harry's allowed a little bit of summer romance, don't you think?"

Sirius' eyes soften at that; a visceral reminder of his prior words. Harry is just a girl, and Tonks is right. She should be allowed a little summer romance, some teenage puppy love, some brief happiness far removed from this approaching war. She should be allowed to just enjoy being a kid, while she still has this brief opportunity to do so.

"Well yes, I suppose." He admits at great length, before he smiles at her, rakishly. "But you must understand that I'll want to meet him, you know. Just to make sure he's—of the right stock."

Harry privately prays that this never comes to pass. Outwardly, she gives him a strained smile. "Right."

This horrible conversation cannot be over fast enough.

.

.

.

The trial to get returned to Hogwarts could have gone a lot worse, but as it is she tries very hard not to remember it. There was no use getting worked up over Fudge—he'd have to face the truth eventually, and quite frankly, she hadn't made up her mind whether she approved of his stupidity or wanted to berate him for it. On the one hand, he really was going to get everyone killed. On the other, he is only working in Voldemort's favor right now. But is that something she wants? But this was a whole other debacle.

Her main concern was Dumbledore. There was a strained undercurrent between them, and for the life of her she couldn't understand why. It's not as if Dumbledore knew anything about her summer—or at least, he couldn't, right? That was impossible. How would he know? But he had conclusively ignored her when she'd attempted to get his attention back at the Ministry, and didn't appear all that interested in giving her an explanation.

Fifth year hasn't even really started and already her thoughts are drifting towards Riddle Manor—towards home— and the ghost that haunts its halls. It's strange to think that this time last year she had been gripped with terror at the very thought of the dark lord. But now she is gripped with an unease she is unused to, worrying over him, wondering how he's fairing… if he misses her at all.

She feels very stupid for it, but she does it nonetheless.

She feels even more foolish writing her letter.

It is dim and quiet in the library as she sits with Hermione, who furiously pens down their Potions essay that Harry hasn't even wrote an introductory paragraph for. Why bother, when no matter how much or how little she writes Professor Snape always returns it to her with an unremarkable 'Acceptable'? But this just means she has a lot of time on her hands to think about her embarrassing outburst from earlier that year.

In the end, it results in nothing that is particularly significant, or interesting for that matter. She writes to him about her classes—all of which are some combination of: boring, dreadfully boring, or uselessly difficult. She takes great pleasure in writing just how awful this year's Slytherin team is, and how judiciously they had beaten them in their match a few days ago. Harry ends it with a lot of questions, forcing him to have to reply.

The days roll by unendingly, and Harry holds fast to the string inside her heart, connecting her to Voldemort. It gives her comfort when she lays in the dark, courage when her own wavers, patience when the infuriating new professor gets on her nerves. Just knowing that he's there on the other side is enough.

Especially with Umbridge making it her life's work to drive Harry to insanity.

Fine. So maybe Harry couldn't make up her mind about what side she was on, but she did know one thing; she didn't want anyone to die. And that is exactly what was going to happen if Umbridge kept insisting that they didn't need to learn any spells: there was nothing wrong, the dark lord didn't exist, the world was full of sunshine. She was… utterly infuriating. Everything about her was making Harry's already frayed nerves grow progressively worse.

And worse—there is nothing she hates worse than being called a _liar_. If there's one thing she's not, it's that.

"I'm not lying!" She cries, incredulous, uncaring that the whole class can hear them. "Why would I lie about this? Why would Cedric? Or Dumbledore—

"That is enough!" Umbridge shrieks, but Harry ignores her.

"Voldemort is back, you stupid bint, you're going to get everyone killed!"

"Enough! _Enough_! Detention, Miss Potter!" She screams in response. "See me later, in my office." She composes herself once more, twitching slightly as she fluffs herself up.

Harry sneers at her, but holds her tongue, looking away.

.

.

Things get worse.

Harry scowls out into the distance, idly eying the world unfurling from the owlery tower. Hedwig coos on the ledge beside her, as if in commiseration. She smiles wanly at her dear owl, running a finger down the side of her head, through the downy feathers there. She murmurs a quiet thank you to her bird, plucking the letter out of her beak with anticipation. She breaks the seal, promptly ignoring the envelope that falls to the ground, the chirping of the owls roosting in the tower, even Hedwig, in the face of the letter in her hands.

Her smile grows into something almost uncontrollable when she realizes that the dark lord has deigned to write her back.

More than that, it's two pages long.

She sits for some time on the lopsided steps of the tower, resting against the stone wall and looking down the winding staircase, simply staring sightlessly out into the world, grinning stupidly at absolutely nothing.

The dopey smile remains on her face for the rest of the day, much to the curiosity of her friends.

"What's gotten into you?" Hermione blinks up at her, surprised, when she sits down beside her in the common room, completely unable to stop smiling.

She shakes her head. "Oh, it's nothing."

"It's not nothing," Ron snorts, sliding into the seat beside her. "You were in a right foul mood not an hour ago. You practically bit my head off earlier!"

"You're right, I'm sorry about that." She replies, chastised. "I didn't mean to snap… it's just with Umbrdige and her stupid detention's—

"It's alright mate," Ron waves her off. "I'd want to stab someone with a dinner fork too if I had to sit in a room with that nut for so long."

Hermione turns worried eyes towards her. "How's your hand?"

She blinks, looking down at it. She'd actually forgotten about the pain in the face of her letter.

"It doesn't hurt as much," she lies.

It's a good thing its not her writing hand—how would she respond to Tom otherwise? She's read the thing front to back at least three times already and she giddily moves to do it again.

"What is that, Harry?" Ron peers over her shoulder. She flushes, slamming it back onto the table.

But this just leaves it open for Hermione to pry it from beneath her fingers. Her mouth drops open in indignation, ready to fight her for it, but Hermione holds it out of her reach.

"Tom," she drawls, smiling. "Who's Tom?"

Harry goes bright red. "N—Nothing! I mean—no one! He's no one!"

Ron snorts. "Yeah, sounds like nothing."

She flails wildly for it, and though she can't quite reach it she does stop Hermione from reading it. "Hermione, give it back!" She hisses, trying to reach around her for it. Hermione pouts, but does relinquish it.

Harry grabs it quick, rolling it up in her hands and holds it close to her chest, eying the two of them warily.

"Harry, we're only joking," Hermione laughs, though there is a spark of worry to her eyes. "You know that, right?"

Harry glares at her, before sighing. "Yeah, I know—I just, I don't want to talk about it."

She holds the letter tightly, spinning around and deciding she'll just have to write her response later.

.

.

Harry doesn't quite not know what to say in response, her thoughts drifting off intermittently every sentence or two, smiling quietly off into the distance.

Hermione eyes her shrewdly, before she pokes her in the cheek with the end of her quill.

"Ow!" Harry scowls, turning around to glare at her. "What was that for?"

"You're doing it again," Hermione notes, amused.

"Doing what?" She retorts hotly.

"Dopily smiling off into the distance—what are you writing?"

She jerks the parchment away at this, reluctant to give Hermione another chance to grab it from her. "N—Nothing. It's my potions essay."

"Oh come on, you wouldn't be smiling about school, least of all potions." Hermione rolls her eyes. "And you never write them, anyway. Come on—spill!"

Harry gazes at her warily. Hermione only blinks at her innocently.

"Alright fine," Harry sighs. "I'm writing a letter."

"I figured." She smiles wryly. "To who, might I ask?"

And, when Harry doesn't reply; "Is it Tom?"

Harry scowls. "What does it matter if it is?"

Hermione shakes her head, smile growing. She winks, much to Harry's confusion. "It doesn't."

Harry rears back, narrowing her eyes. "What?"

"Nothing," Hermione shrugs, secretive smile still in place. "Say hello to Tom for me, will you?"

Harry snorts. Highly unlikely. Who knows what's up with Hermione, she's being barmy.

At any rate, she is simply pleased he responded at all. She finds herself fiddling with the necklace at all hours of the day—habit now, it seems. She longs to use it; wonders what the dark lord is up to, whenever her fingers clasp around the cool, ivory stone. He seems—distracted, as of late. His attention fixated on something else.

He _is_ the Dark Lord, she reminds herself. Whatever he is fixating on can't be good.

She doesn't ask, of course.

**10.**

Harry does not want to teach an incorrigible group of classmates how to do some basic spells. First, she is allergic to responsibility. And second, why must it be her? Everyone looks to her as if she should have all the answers, even when they scorn her and slander her in the papers, in the halls when they think she can't see them. Pansy is the worst of the lot, as is Malfoy, but unfortunately neither of them are here. She'd love to get some hexing practice out on them.

It should be obvious by now though, why they are so insistent upon her, why they all turn wide eyes towards her.

She's Harry Potter—she vanquished he-who-must-not-be-named long before she even knew how to speak. She's the girl-who-lived.

She snorts.

How quickly they change their tune when they want something out of her—if only they knew the truth.

They have all assembled before her in the room of requirement, turning eager faces towards her. She has no idea what to teach them.

In the end she settled for _stupefy._ That should keep them occupied for some time. Something curiously close to guilt wells uncomfortably in her when they speak about being ready to face the Dark Lord. How willing they are to oppose him, to arm themselves against him. She is not sure who she feels the guilt towards—these students, for her relationship with Voldemort? Or Voldemort, for teaching these children how to oppose him? That sounds like something that would make him incredibly angry.

She ends up telling him anyway.

Not in so many words—just that she has been unwilling grappled into some kind of 'study group' meant to practice their defense spells while Umbridge is still ruining their education.

To her surprise, he is not adverse to the idea at all. He even writes that he created something similar during his time at school. Harry blanches; she can imagine what happened to that 'study group' once he graduated. Worse still, she is leaving out a very overwhelming new revelation that hit her smack in the face this school year: The Order of the Phoenix. And she can't find it in her to tell him. She knows exactly what will happen if she does: he will hunt them down one by one and kill them before they can become a threat. And the members are too dear for her to ever even think of that.

Aside from school, the 'DA'—Dumbledore's Army—as they call themselves (which is quite horrifying, and she was completely unable to get them to change it), her classes, the Order, and Quidditch, Harry fiddles with one more (personal) issue that has arisen to drive her crazy with stress. The summer months have long since left the planes of Scotland, and the northern hemisphere in general, leaving everything brittle and cold. She tries not to think of her new, strange relationship with the Dark Lord who killed her parents, especially on the day of their death. She cannot find it in her to hate him for this, and it eats away at her in an amalgamation of guilt, shame, and more guilt. How can she not hate him? How could she become so friendly with her parent's killer?

How could she be sitting here fretting on what to get him for Christmas—a decision that has taken up almost the entirety of her thoughts for the past few weeks—when she should be thinking up ways to destroy him?

This confliction does not help either of these: she still does not know how to feel about him, and she still does not know what to get him for Christmas. And his birthday. Oh Merlin, his birthday is over break too, isn't it? New Years eve, she remembers vividly, from her dreams. How is she supposed to figure out not one, but _two_?

As the holidays near dozens of magazines full of owl-order gifts arrive for all the students finding themselves in a situation similar to hers.

Except the people they're gift shopping for probably aren't anywhere near as difficult to shop for as Lord Voldemort.

He is the opposite of materialistic; the very few possessions he has are of infinite value to him, and everything else is met with scorn and disinterest.

She cracks, finally, and asks Hermione for advice.

"What do you get for someone who doesn't like anything?" She asks urgently, when Ron turns around to feast himself upon the pumpkin pie.

Hermione blinks at her rapidly. "Um?" She puts her fork down. "Who are you buying this for?"

"A _friend_," she replies quickly, and it feels horrible on her tongue. Her relationship with the dark lord is not so simple enough to be considered a 'friendship'.

She eyes her critically. "The same _friend _you stayed over summer break with?"

She nods.

"You're spending the holidays with him, then?"

Harry nods again.

"Harry, I'm a little worried, honestly." She leans close. Ron has begun to choke, and Seamus leans over to slap a violent hand against his back. This is met with uproarious laughter from the boys, as Ron sputters his way out of a seizure. "I don't know how much I like the idea of you spending so much time with a boy you don't really know… he could be taking advantage of you!"

_You don't even know the half of it_, she digresses, silently. Ron heaves a projectile lump of something onto Dean. More laughter ensues.

"I'll be fine, Mione," she insists, but it is vacuous and ineffectual, and they both know it.

"You care about him a lot," the studious girl observes.

Harry seizes up, flushing. "What? I—no! I just, you know, he's been really nice. It seems like the nice thing to do."

"It's Tom, isn't it? That's his name?"

Harry staunchly refuses to reply to this. "Maybe it is." She sniffs, when it becomes clear Hermione is going to attempt to badger it out of her. "Maybe it isn't. It's just—it's the polite thing to do. It's good manners, is all."

Hermione gives her a rather unimpressed look. "You wouldn't be so worried if you didn't care."

She grows silent.

Hermione heaves a great sigh, shaking out her curly hair. "Well, I suppose you should at least tell me his likes and dislikes." It's a peace offering, and one she intends to take great advantage of.

"Um.." She starts, sheepish. "Well, I don't really know what he likes. I know a lot of stuff he _doesn't _like."

Hermione gives her a look of disbelief. "Alright," she allows at length. "And what does he not like?"

"Everything."

It is going to be a long day.

.

.

.

In the end, the perfect gift presents itself.

Mcgonagall reveals their midterm to be a lesson in futility and smuggling headache potions from the infirmary. A soul gem is meant to be turned from an ordinary rock, transfigured into the physical representation of one's soul. It is also tedious, difficult, and long; frustration runs rampant in the class. Ron has seized his rock by the hand and flung it out the Gryffindor tower window at least a dozen times this week. The twins are making a killing on headache, stress-relief, and pepper-up potions swiped from Madame Pomfrey's stores.

But for all the unending frustration this stupid rock has given her, it is actually quite pretty.

Perfect, actually.

At first glance, it appears wholly unremarkable. It is made of sharp, geometric lines of an indeterminable stormy color, intermittent with silver upon the glossy planes. The rock itself is very smooth, like refined platinum, wrapped in chalice. But held up in a certain striking light, long panels of dark scarlet will streak across the surface. And after, in the dim glow of a lampshade, or perhaps a candle, the stone becomes olivine in constitution, seized by a marmoreal, viridian light. But these vivid colors last only for a brief, insignificant moment—so quick they are perhaps just a trick of the eye.

But she knows this specific shade of red, as closely as she does that shade of green, which looks upon her critically in the mirror every morning. And the slate gray of its form, so very like the tumultuous stormclouds in Tom Riddle's eyes. She wonders what it could mean.

She still dreams of him all the time.

It feels… intrusive, almost.

The Tom Riddle in her dreams is so vastly different than the Dark Lord that it's sometimes difficult to reconcile the two together. Tom Riddle feels concern and unease—he is indecisive, unsure of himself. He feels great sorrow: bitterness, loneliness. He is at school now, whenever she closes her eyes to dream. Even school age he is dashingly handsome, but very shy. He hides it behind a facsimile indifference; pretends it doesn't hurt when his fellow housemates scorn him for his blood, when he finds himself just another outcast after all.

He tells himself he doesn't care about any of them. He doesn't care about all the other orphans; he doesn't care about his year mates or his housemates; his teachers who overlook him even with his brilliance—

Doesn't care about his father, who lies dead upon the floor.

Harry jolts awake.

Her pillow is damp with tears, some still streak upon her face, still. She brings a hand up, numbly, wiping them away. Even in the world of the wakeful, she can still see the boyish form of a young Tom Riddle; he stands alone in a room full of dead people, his wand has long since fallen from his trembling hands. He appears stoic and unmoved, aside from his eyes, leaking traitorous tears.

"Harry?" Hermione stirs, almost unwillingly, in the bed beside her.

Harry jumps again, wiping furiously at her eyes. "Yeah?" Comes out from behind her hands, muffled, but clearly thick with choking sadness.

"Oh—Harry," Hermione is surely awake now, concern so evident even in the darkness. "What's wrong? What happened?"

She shakes her head wildly; it is less for Hermione and more for her. "Nothing," she convinces herself. "Just… had a bad dream."

How could she possibly hate this boy, who has only ever wanted the comfort and affection of another?

Perhaps Lord Voldemort is cold and unfeeling, but this is only because he has turned himself away from a world that had already turned itself away from him.

**25.**

It is so very strange, to wake up to a world where he is not by her side.

Her bed feels empty, foreign. Terribly alone. One hand wanders into the drifting sunlight, as if reaching for something that now only exists in her dreams. She closes her eyes, and pretends she can feel him, if only for a moment. Her hand reaches further, and the illusion shatters. He would never have been so far away from her. He always starts the night determinably settled upon the far side of the bed; but every morning she wakes to his soft breath upon her forehead, their legs tangled together, and his hand in her hair, so ensnared it may be stuck in there forever.

She would blink sleepily into the diffused morning glow, unwillingly drawn from her dreams, refusing to acknowledge the fact that she's awake. She'd prefer to be asleep in his arms forever, never to deal with the world outside this room again. He would wake eventually though, stirring around her, hand tightening upon her hip. And though they were both awake, they would not leave the bed until far into the afternoon, preoccupied with far more pleasurable endeavors than whatever could await them outside.

Harry opens her eyes.

Her fingers grasp ineffectually into the air; dust motes shiver, caught in the morning haze; the curtains of her bed flutter in the windless air.

The marks upon her hips have faded; five identical marks in the perfect shape of his hand on each side. There is no hot, insistent mouth to lave dark kisses into her skin, no warm breath in her ear, making her shiver. He is always so masterful when he draws out little gasps from her, always knows just where to press those dexterous fingers to make her whimper or where to draw his mouth to watch her shudder apart, breaking, begging. He is in possession of an incredibly talented mouth, this is true. That isn't to say he lacks talent with his fingers, or his—

Harry sits up, scowling, feeling hot all over. Why must she think such dirty thoughts, all the time? It must be the curse of adolescence. It doesn't seem like such a curse when he is there to so skillfully attend to her; except he's not here now, and anything aside from him is always unsatisfying.

"Harry?" Lavender blinks up from where she has a small army of hair products laid out before her on her bureau, sparing her a brief glance. "What are you doing up so early?"

"I need a shower," she says by way of explanation: a cold one, at that.

Lavender appears even more curios at that, tossing out to her just as she reaches the bathroom; "I see those bruises have finally faded, huh?" A teasing lilt to her voice.

"It's a tragedy," Harry agrees, completely serious. Lavender laughs, taking her flat tone as sarcasm.

"Well there's always Yule break, isn't there?" Comes her mirthful response, floating into the bathroom.

Harry appraises her reflection with a critical eye. She sort of looks like a redheaded raccoon who just got mauled by a hair dryer. But then again, getting her hair to do anything is a lesson in futility.

"That's way too far away," Harry replies, turning away from her unfortunate-looking mirror image to turn on one of the showers.

She's just stepping in as she hears Lavender enter the bathroom. "Is he really that good that you're already so impatient?" The brunette inquires, equal parts genuine curiosity and unrepentant mockery.

"You've no idea," she breaks into a secretive smile at the thought of Lavender's face if she ever found out who 'he' is.

Lavender catches her face in the mirror as she holds out a mascara wand, brows rising. "Harry, I think you're holding out on me here."

"How so?" She turns back into the spray, reaching for some hair product. It's definitely Hermione's—if it can tame her bookish friend's bushy locks, maybe it might actually be able to tame the mess she calls hair.

"I need details!" Lavender whines. "Listen, Harry, ever since I stopped seeing that Ravenclaw, my life has become so boring. I need to live vicariously through you."

Harry snorts. It'd be a miracle if she could ever refer to her life as 'boring'. "I'm afraid you might find my life just as uneventful as yours." She lies.

Lavender guffaws. "Not with those bruises—Harry, you came to school this year looking like a spotted leopard!"

That's very true. The Dark Lord is very insistent and diligent in keeping as many as possible on her, for as long as possible. She always means to confront him about it, but she's usually far too distracted when he makes them to protest.

Harry smirks, rubbing suds into her hair. "Maybe I like it that way."

"Harry!" Lavender cries, delighted. "Oh come now, don't hold out on me!"

The idea of rehashing her sex life to Lavender is both utterly hilarious and also completely mortifying. But they're sixteen year old girls, isn't this what they do? Gossip about boys? And, more importantly, gossip about what they _do_ with boys? Well, it's not as if he's ever going to find out…

"What do you want me to say? He's certainly a man who knows how to use his—" she cuts off with a snicker, wholly incapable of finishing that sentence. "He's very, uh, skilled, if you know what I mean."

"Really? How big is he?"

Harry chokes on a mouthful of soapy water, sputtering and coughing up a lung in response to this.

Lavender looks completely unapologetic: also, very insistent.

"I—I don't know!" Harry retorts, hotly, feeling her cheeks burn. "What—do you want me to take out a measuring stick?"

"Well it doesn't have to be in cubic inches or anything!" Lavender rolls her eyes, and then—to Harry's unending mortification—starts to mime with her hands. "Y'know, just like, a rough estimate."

Harry, against her better judgment, finds herself genuinely contemplating this. Good Merlin, she's not really going to—

But then she's already brought her hands up, eying the space between them, before her rational thought can catch up. She shows Lavender, whose eyes grow wide, brows raised. Harry's a little concerned she may have… overestimated. But then, he's not exactly small.

"_Oh,_ Harry," she enthuses, purring. "How very unfair! I swear, boys our age are always so boring—not to mention incompetent and… ill-equipped. I'm very jealous. In fact, I'm raving with envy."

Harry can't even hide her snickers at that. Oh, Lavender, if only you knew…

Unfortunately the rest of the day gets progressively worse.

Tom's letter comes in today, right atop her morning toast, and though she's absolutely bursting at the seams in anticipation, she swallows her excitement and tucks it into her bag. She darts a wary eye towards the head table, wondering if Dumbledore could possibly know. But how? It's just mail. She—and about everyone else in this hall—gets mail about once a day. It can't seem that strange.

Not to mention Hermione's livid frustration when it becomes apparent that Harry has, indeed, become a Potion's Master overnight. Slughorn is utterly charmed at the sight of her, always droning on about her mother and their similar looks, and her talent in potions—of which he falsely believes Harry has inherited even a small portion of.

Tom was… agitated, when she mentioned that Slughorn was her Potion's professor. He quickly became silent on the matter, but Harry thought she could feel wariness nonetheless. Apparently Slughorn was old enough to also have been Tom's teacher, so maybe it's just residual hatred from his own time at Hogwarts.

She doesn't want to think about that anyway. She doesn't want to think about the prophecy looming over their heads, the machinations that he is undoubtedly a part of, or her apparent role in all of this. She wants to be as far away as possible from it, settled into the alluring universe of Tom's arms, so far removed from the rest of the world that it's as if it never existed at all.

But it's starting to feel as if it is only inevitable for her to be dragged out of that false world, and back into the shocking cold of reality.

**11.**

Yule break cannot come fast enough.

Harry clasps her hands against her necklace impatiently, eyes darting to the world outside the window, as if she glared hard enough it would move faster.

"Blimey Harry," Ron yawns, sprawled out upon the opposite seat. "I've never seen you so excited to go back to the Dursley's."

Hermione sends her a narrow, indagated glance at this. Harry studiously avoids it.

She shrugs. "I guess there's just… more to be excited about."

"Are you _sure _you don't want to spend the holidays with us?" He sits up straighter. "Mum'll be devastated when she finds out you're not coming."

"I know, I'm sorry." Truly though, she is. The thought of the Burrow makes something ache in her chest, but it is overwhelmed by her longing for Tom. Voldemort and Tom. Both of them have never experienced a happy Christmas. Not to mention even an acknowledgment of their birthday. The thought saddens her. She knows that feeling very well; it is not one she would wish upon anyone.

Harry gives Ron a wan smile. "Perhaps I can pop over for a bit on Christmas Day." She hedges.

Ron takes this at face value, nodding.

Harry practically leaps out of the train, jumping onto the platform with an energy that surprises even her. She pulls her trunk behind her, looking around the station. This is unnecessary though; she cannot feel him in the crowd, no tugging in her heart drawing her into the distant fog.

Instead she turns around and wishes her friends a wonderful holiday, before she darts into the throng of exuberant parents. When she is suitably lost enough, she struggles out of the crowd and over towards the wall, far out of sight for the majority of the platform.

She tugs the necklace out from under her shirt. The jewel is warm in her palm.

Harry grasps it tightly.

"Take me home," she whispers, and then she is pulled through space and time from a tug in her navel.

.

.

Riddle Manor and its lone occupant have not changed much.

The overgrown lawn is obscured by a gelid blanket of soft snow; tufts of white that perch upon the stern brows of the windows, the roof, the ledges. It sits entirely untouched, not one footstep to mar the ivory surface.

Harry heads inside, where she is greeted with a pleasant gust of warm air.

Her feet lead her towards her room. She swings the door open with a wide grin—it looks exactly as she left it. _Her _room. Her very own room, all to herself; if she wants to leave the bed unmade she can; if she wants to throw clothes about in a haphazard mess, she can do that too. She settles upon the bed, swishing her wand to unpack all her belongings. Foreign things have found their way into her safe haven, things she would have never have thought she'd find in her room. There are little, opalescent bottles lined primly upon her bureau: nail polish, in brilliant colors. A little bag full of makeup—most of it things from Lavender, but some are hers; a bottle of Sleekeezys that Hermione insists is a necessity for her hair. Harry pinches a lock of it, drawing it up to her eyes with a critical eye: Hermione is probably right. It's not bushy like her best friend's, nor is it finely curled like Lavenders. Rather, it is straight in some places and wavy in others, standing up every which way in an untamed mess.

Harry pauses, suddenly.

When had she changed? When did she start caring about what she looked like—what color her nails are, if her face looks pretty or not?

She flushes suddenly, all the way down to her toes.

Why does she care so much right now—more than she ever has before— when the only one who's there to impress is the Dark Lord Voldemort?

The answer should be obvious.

She draws her trembling hands off the top of her drawers, turning her head to look into the mirror on the side of her room. Her profile looks… pretty. Lavender has finally taught her the elusive art of eyeliner, after they spent months on mascara. She looks—different. Older. Less like an untamable little gremlin running about the halls and more like a young woman. It's crazy what a little bit of hair potion and kohl can do to a person.

Well, she most certainly doesn't need any blush, Harry notices. Not with the outrageous flush that refuses to leave her cheeks.

Against her will, her mutinous thoughts begin to take hold of her; would he think she's pretty? Would he prefer her hair straight, or in the dictated curls she's only recently learned to master? All Lavender and Parvati do in their dorm is talk about boys they fancy—but more than that, debating if those boys fancy them back. It's a topic of unending discussion: Does he prefer blondes or brunettes? Blue eyes or brown? Would he think her breasts are too small? And, Hermione's favorite—whenever she deigns to join the conversation—'_Are you sure he's not using you for sex?_' These are all questions that circuitously return in an unending cycle back at school; Harry feels herself grow hot in horror when she tries to apply any of them to the Dark Lord.

Mainly because she feels ridiculous wondering all this stuff about him—but also because she has no idea what the answers to any of them would be.

Harry crawls under her blankets, moping.

She was looking forward to seeing him again with such unparalleled fervor earlier—now she wants to stay here and die.

.

.

There is an unimaginably small distance between them, and yet it appears to have drawn onto the couch like a steel wall.

Lord Voldemort narrows his eyes.

Harry Potter shifts nervously, a scant few inches away from him, a scant few very _intentional _inches. He is still boggled over how drastically a teenage girl can change in the space of a few months unattended. Where is the impossible hair, the broken sandals, the bruises on her shins from frolicking in the wilds? It's as if a strange pod person has replaced her, perched delicately upon the couch in an identical body.

"Harry," he starts. She jumps, before she very carefully turns her eyes towards him. Her hands fiddle in her lap; her eyes appear to be fixated upon something directly above his shoulder.

He frowns.

"Sorry," she ripostes, quickly. "I—um, I just… I don't feel well."

He frowns further. "Why did you not say something earlier?"

If possible, she looks even more uncomfortable. "It just crept up on me," she stutters. "I think—I think I'm going to rest for a bit."

And then she's out the door like a flighty bird, darting into the hall as a trailing, vermillion light. He watches her disappear into the gloom, utterly bewildered. Has he done something to upset her? But how? He barely had time to say hello, before she was already sprinting out the door.

And then, with great resignation, he thinks that perhaps this is only inevitable. She _is_ a teenage girl, after all.

.

.

Harry locks herself in the bathroom, assuming that this is the last place on earth Lord Voldemort would dare follow her into.

She closes her eyes, sagging onto the door.

Good Merlin, she's doomed.

She had just spent the better part of the afternoon hiding in her room, attempting to reconcile the fact that she—sort of, maybe, kind of—_liked_ him. This was horrifying enough as it was. She wished she could lie to herself. She wished she could pretend that she hadn't spent all year looking forward to seeing him again, seeing her parent's killer, her _almost_ killer. The man responsible for hundreds of deaths. Who may even be killing people now. Who knows? He warned her not to go to the dungeons. Maybe he's down there right now, throwing unforgivables at innocents.

But by the time dinner rolled around, she had come to terms with it. Well, she had accepted the fact that—to her unending mortification—she liked Lord Voldemort. He was… unconventional, to say the least. But perhaps there was something rather striking about him, tall and pale and cloaked in black, with a tangible power that licked against her whenever he entered the room. Certainly no one could really blame her; Tom Riddle was not exactly bad looking.

And just as she had accepted this, the Dark Lord strode into the room, and completely derailed every thought in her head.

Harry slides down onto the floor, head in her hands.

This is horrible.

How is she supposed to exist in a world with the perfect face of Lord Voldemort staring down upon her, scolding her for leaving the backdoor open, for trailing mud into the mansion, for falling asleep outside in the cold?

When she looks up at herself, she thinks she's been blushing so deeply for so long that the color might just stay there forever.

Considering the long weeks with only his company to look forward to, that might just come to pass.

.

.

.

The child is avoiding him.

This becomes quite obvious when she canoodles her way out of dinner for a second time, claiming that same elusive illness from earlier. It always seems to rise up whenever he's around.

This shouldn't bother him as much as it does. There is no reason to put such stake into the silly whims of a teenage girl; he refuses to. There are other matters to attend to, anyway. His plans to infiltrate the Ministry have bore few results. He's grown tired of both Malfoy and Rookwood's meager excuses—perhaps it is time for a visit to Malfoy Manor. It would be a far better use of his time than attempting to wrangle out whatever Harry's sudden issue with him.

The days grow lengthy; more snow dumps itself upon the grounds, becoming something of a hindrance. The prophecy remains obscured and completely out of his reach.

Harry has made her vanishing act into a minor art form.

It grows tiring about the fourth or fifth time she manages to do it; wiggling off the couch and out the door so fluidly, finding ways around him, avoiding the library like a particularly contagious pestilence.

And when he draws out of his office, finding her sitting silently in the empty sitting room just across the hall, he decides it's high time to confront the problem. She looks up very quickly at his entrance—looks back down just as fast, focusing all of her attention to her feet.

Harry curses herself silently for managing to get herself into this predicament. She had been so careful, so concise with her every action, as to avoid him as much as possible. It had been working rather well, too, yet something very close to guilt eats away at her whenever she manages another escape. It's not the distance that bothers her—it's the first flicker of surprise that darts across his features when she darts out of the room. Surprise… and hurt. She knows she's hurting him, even though she doesn't mean to. He would deny it to hell and back, of course, but she knows him far too intimately not to see it.

His dark crimson eyes are fixated upon her, but she doesn't look up. Long, horrible silentious moments pass, poisonous and corrosive and eating away at her resolve. He does not move to sit; nor does he move at all. He simply… regards her.

And finally, when she thinks she can bare it no longer:

"There's no need to force yourself," he snaps, acerbically, once the silence has gone on long enough. "If my presence is so difficult for you to bear, you are free to leave at your leisure."

She looks up at that. Her eyes widen, something like terror rising in her throat. "What?"

And then, sputtering, "No, that's not—

"I have other matters to attend to." He cuts her off. "Your paltry excuses will have to wait."

And then he is turning around—leaving the room. She bolts upright, intending to follow. "No—wait, please, don't leave!"

He pauses, stilling. He turns his head slightly, until one cruel, cold eye can fixate upon her; the color of heat and fire, causing ice to freeze around her heart.

"You've made it very clear that you've no wish to even be in the same room as me."

Harry bites her lip, hands balled up into trembling fists, trying to find a way out of that umbrageous, impassive gaze. It is Lord Voldemort who stands before her, tall and cold as artic ivory; the cruel man who murdered her parents; who emerged from black magic in a decrepit graveyard. It is not _her _Lord Voldemort, who explains to her spells she can't quite grasp with unending patience, who lets her fall asleep upon him, who carries her to bed.

"That's not it at all," she whispers, shaking.

He ignores her. "There's no need to stay on my account; if it truly so burdensome, you are free to leave if you wish. I'm not keeping you here."

She'd have preferred the volcanic rage to this At least when he's angry she can get angry right back—but he has closed her off, standing as a callous, indifferent figure with no regard for her at all. She doesn't know how to find her way back to him.

She shakes her head. "You've got it all wrong."

"Have I?" He turns around at that, as still as stone—an unfeeling statue of perfect pale marble. "Then by all means, Harry, plead your case."

She blinks up at him with big, conflicted green eyes. She's biting her lip so intensely he thinks she might be drawing blood. He givers her a moment, if only to prove his point. He derives dark satisfaction from the hurt in her eyes.

"Ah, but even still, you refuse to answer." He turns away once more, refusing to stay where he's not wanted.

He makes for the door: she catches his hand.

"I don't want you to leave," she whispers, unsteady.

"You are doing an excellent job convincing me of this." He snorts, derisive. Her hand grips him tighter.

"It's not... I'm not—I don't mean to…" But her small voice falls short; determination and an incomprehensible fear war upon her face.

"I have no desire to discuss this further, Harry." He scorns, turning to face her. She hadn't realized just how close he was standing: so close it is as if those fiery eyes could burn into her soul. "I'll not stay where I'm not wanted—

And then she's tugging him forward and closing the infinitesimally small distance between them, catching his words with her mouth.

The touch of her lips is so light, so delicate, it is as if he dreamed it. But the foreign warmth is undeniable; the pliant indent of her bottom lip, just as soft as he imagined it to be; the lovely sweetness of her breath; the gentle movement of her lips beneath his own—these are all things far too beautiful to have come from his own thoughts. There is a sense of belonging that sparks within his chest at the touch; the same one that tingles down his spine at the feel of her fingers upon his own, her head resting on his shoulder. As if his own soul recognizes the other part of it as an essence of the self—of home.

And then it is gone, just as quickly as it had come.

He stares down on her, completely unable to create coherent thought. Her eyes grow wide with horror and color blooms upon her cheeks—_the pink upon her is quite lovely; he wonders how far it goes down_—and she leaps away from him as if burned. He cannot quite decipher the look in her eyes, swimming with a thousand different emotions. Fear is the most prevalent; horror, embarrassment, profound mortification, and an indisputable affection that draws his attention away from the others.

She blinks her enormous eyes and stares back, mutely. And then she is bolting out the door before he can move to stop her.

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	3. i - iii

** / / S**

The power the dark lord knows not.

shouta / underage / mature themes / dark themes

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_H I D E_

_( I HAVE BURNED YOUR BRIDGES )_

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**PART I**

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**12.**

She doesn't mind the almost unbearable gelid wind, or the long and unending walk to Blackburn. They both serve to numb her thoughts—and limbs—until she can't feel anything at all. Good. It's better this way. Why can't she exist like this always? It would be so much simpler, so much easier…

So much less embarrassing.

Harry still can't bring herself to acknowledge what she's done, even when she finally reaches the town (that truck driver was right, she really did spend all day getting over here) and finds a petrol station with a payphone. The sun bends ever so slightly against the roof of the BP station, burning on the last of its embers upon a dark prussian sky—it'll be dark soon enough.

Hermione takes forever picking up, and once she does bombards Harry with questions she really doesn't want to answer.

In the end Hermione convinces her mother to drive down to Blackburn to pick her up, and she spends a horrible hour car ride in miserable silence. There's note even passing scenery to distract her—the world outside is obscured in an inky blackness, leaving nothing but her equally miserable , pallid face reflected onto the glass. She catches Hermione looking at her through it a couple times, but she doesn't look back.

She manages to keep her staunch silence all the way up until Hermione locks her in her bedroom, rounding on her and crossing her arms as she guards the door, as if assuming (quite rightly) that Harry will attempt to bolt out of it.

Her staunchly disapproving expression melts when she finally catches sight of how horrid her best friend looks, bleeding into a deep concern.

"Harry,"

She says, just as Harry chokes out, "I've messed everything up."

Hermione motions towards her bed, leading the other girl towards it. They both sit, and for some time Harry picks at the pale pink bedspread, looking upon the room, expressionless. She has matching pillows and an archaic looking teddy bear that sits on a chair not too far from it. There's a photo of her and her parents on her bedside table, a little blemish on the wooden surface, ancient evidence of nail polish gone awry. Books and books are piled atop every available surface, unsurprisingly, there are no haphazard piles of clothes to be seen anywhere. It looks lived in: it looks like home.

Harry swallows.

Does she even have one to go to? Or has she effectively ruined everything?

"Harry, what's wrong?" Hermione murmurs, brushing a long spilling of hair that obscures Harry's face.

And, to Harry's silence, "Is it…" She hesitates. "Is it about that boy?"

Harry chokes on a laugh. That _boy_? The idea of whatever child Hermione has conjured in her own head in comparison to Lord Voldemort is particularly hilarious.

"Yes," Harry replies; the amusement has left her, leaving her hollow once again. "Sort of—more about me, really. _I_ was the one who messed it up. I –I shouldn't have…" She looks away.

"Harry," she says again, and Harry can hear so much in that tone—all the love and trust and friendship between them.

She takes a breath.

"I…" Harry begins, unsteady. "I have a lot to tell you, Hermione."

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Harry was not surprised at all when Hermione's first remark is one of great mutiny and disapproval, "This whole time, you were talking about Tom—_that _Tom! Tom Riddle! V—err, you-know-who! He's the reason you're at the top of our class in every subject, isn't he?" She accuses, irascible. And then, with horror as the thought occurs: "Is he writing all your essays?"

"What? No!" Harry sputters. "Why—Hermione, don't you think there are more important events to worry about; like, for example, how I'm supposed to ever face him again?"

She pauses. "Well yes I suppose," she agrees, reluctant. "Oh, but Harry… this is utterly unfair. I mean, he's… he's _You-Know-Who_, he's—well, the most terrible wizard to ever live! But the things he must know…" she trials off, looking wistful.

But of course Hermione's first and only concern is about books and studying.

Harry sighs. "You're right about that," she admits at length. "I'm pretty sure he knows everything; also, he's a much better teacher."

This only makes Hermione pout further.

Harry eyes her critically. "Hermione… you're not…" She swallows. "I mean, he's the Dark Lord! You're not—mad?"

"Why would I be mad?" She retorts. "Do I think you're crazy? A little bit. He's a mass murderer—people are scared to even say his name!"

She huffs. "But, I'm pretty sure you of all people know this better than anyone. And you're the only one to have ever faced him, consistently, and come out alive at the end of it. What's it now—three times?"

"Four, counting when I was a baby." She amends faintly.

"I might be wrong but," she throws a hesitant look Harry's way, "you would know him better than anyone, right?"

Harry cannot manage a response to this, nodding around the rocks that have somehow lodged their way into her throat.

She fidgets nervously. "And from what you've told me he seems to be, well, different with you. I can't reconcile the horrible man from all the stories to the one you're talking about."

"That makes two of us then," Harry agrees, so soft it could hardly carry out of her mouth. She feels light-headed; spun up in nerves that only seem to worsen as the minutes roll by, snared in her stomach, crawling up into her chest.

Hermione says nothing to this, staring off into the pastel green of her walls; her attention caught in a hanging picture of the Eiffel tower, in complete synchronicity with the rest of the décor in the room. Harry wonders if Hermione picked everything out herself, or if it was her mother who decorated it for her.

Would her mother have done the same? But what would Lily Potter have imagined for her only daughter? Harry wouldn't know. And it's all because of the man that she was kissing not even twenty-four hours ago.

This should burn within her; livid anger should tremble up her limbs at the very thought of him. Her wonderful parents, that she would never get to know. And their horrid replacements that have made her life miserable for thirteen years of her life—before she finally was rid of them last year.

Against all reason, she finds she can't.

"Are you going to go back to him?" Hermione asks, quiet.

She falls upon Hermione's bed, despondent, staring sightlessly up into the ceiling.

"I don't know," she answers, honestly. Despite her best efforts, a dreadful blush begins to rise to her cheeks. "I don't think I could live through the embarrassment."

Hermione flushes also, looking rather uncomfortable. "Oh," she says, lamely. And then, clearing her throat, "Yes, I suppose that would be rather… difficult."

Harry turns her head towards her bookish friend, genuinely curious. "You don't think it's weird?"

"Well yes," Hermione returns, matter-of-fact. "But then—who am I to tell you who to fancy, you know? He's certainly a… um, _surprising_ choice, but he's your choice, so…"

Harry buries her face into the pillow, wishing she had never brought up such an awkward, mortifying topic.

"So…" Hermione, if possible, looks even more red than she is.

Harry glances at her expression, wary. "What?" She asks, guarded.

"Was he a good kisser?" She blurts out, so fast Harry doesn't process it immediately.

Then she sputters aloud. "Was he a—" she looks away, wanting to melt into the soft comforter beneath her, if only to escape this moment. "I don't know," she answers hotly, at length, "I—we—it was very brief."

Hermione makes a noise of understanding. "And then you… ran out of the room?"

"Ran?" Harry laughs bitterly. "I _sprinted_, Hermione. It was practically teleportation."

"You didn't see his face though?" She presses. "Did he—well, I mean, was he mad? Or did he look like he liked it?"

"He looked confused." She answers, before she throws her hands over her face. "Oh Merlin Hermione, why did I have to do that? I'm never going to be able to talk to him again! How am I supposed to look him in the eye?"

A terrifying thought comes to her, and she removes her fingers just enough to peek up at her best friend. "…What if he tries to talk to me about it?"

Hermione's expression would have been hilarious had Harry thought anything about this situation to be funny.

"I… I think it would be an awful event for the both of you." She decides at length.

Harry could not agree with her more.

"But Harry," she starts, softly. "Are you sure it's not… _requited_?"

Harry's jaw drops as she flushes deeply, wondering if her face might actually be able to combust. "I really don't think so." She returns. "I mean… why would he—uh, like me, you know? I'm just a little girl to him." But even as she says this, she doesn't hold great surety in her words.

Hermione turns a critical eye towards her. "Well, you are very pretty," she observes, clinically. "Probably the prettiest girl in school. Or the one everyone wants to date, at least. And you're not _that_ young anymore."

"That is completely untrue," Harry protests—to all of it.

Hermione ignores her. She scratches her nose, fidgety. "I just—I can't imagine that he hasn't noticed that."

They both fall silent.

Harry doesn't know how she feels about this. How is she supposed to feel? She's not sure how he… _regards_ her, but she knows for sure that it's not in the way she regards him. It's true she means a lot more to him than a terrorizing little house guest that is constantly messing up all the furniture. They have a connection, so intimate that it scares her sometimes. She's seen all the parts of him he tries to hide—the past he is so ashamed of, and every sorrowful thought he's ever had.

She sighs.

"Why don't we just go to bed and forget we ever had this conversation?" Harry suggests.

"Yes, yes—excellent idea. It is rather late, isn't it?" Hermione agrees hastily, moving to pull down the bed covers.

They settle into a dark, torturous silence for some time. Eventually Harry's heart manages to remember how to beat normally, and then the exhaustion really does hit her. It's been a long, stressful day.

"Night Harry," Hermione mumbles beside her.

"Goodnight Hermione," Harry whispers back, and then, biting her lip, "And thank you."

Hermione gives her an unintelligible grunt in response. Harry smiles, before rolling over and joining her in her sleep.

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The next day finds both of them wandering around in the bright sunshine of Diagon Alley; it turns out they'd both gotten Ginny the same thing, so Harry offered to change hers to a new broom cleaning kit as Hermione scrambled for some last minute gift shopping for Ron. Harry already got him a Chudley Cannons sweater.

She's bought perfect gifts for all her friends: really nice eye makeup for Lavender, and an equally nice set of lipstick colors for Parvati; Hermione was probably expecting a book of some kind, so Harry got her this dress she'd been eying longingly all year.

It wasn't her friends Harry was worried about.

She'd finally found the perfect Christmas gift for Tom—but what of his birthday? She wanted to have something for both; two events that he never found any reason to get excited over, if only because no one ever cared to celebrate them. But they had to be absolutely perfect. She'd given generic birthday gifts in the past, and certainly gotten her fair share of them—and a lot of gag ones—that she appreciated all the same, but she didn't hold regard for them the way she did the meaningful ones.

And this was the first… she didn't think _anyone _had ever given him a birthday present, let alone acknowledged his birthday.

She wanted it to be something amazing; something that he would never be able to forget. And just… something he would like. Something he would appreciate.

Except—he didn't seem to appreciate much of anything.

Aside from her.

Harry shakes herself out of her thoughts before she ends up blushing for the umpteenth time that day, pivoting into Gringotts without a second thought. Hermione had weaseled her way into the book store, ostensibly to find something for Ron, but they both knew there was absolutely nothing in that store that Ron wouldn't burn at the stake. Harry had been a little annoyed with that—she really didn't want to face the goblins alone.

They scared her.

But when she had told Hermione this, she only gave her an incredulous look. "You're not scared of the Dark Lord—but you're terrified at the thought of bank clerks?" She balked.

Seeing the truth in her words, Harry decided to go at it alone. But, as it turned out, the goblins were rather scary. Scary and mean, that's for sure.

Still, they took her to her vault without much fanfare, and before long she was staring down somewhat familiar double doors leading to her vault.

It was as she clamored into the chamber, debating how much gold to take out, when she found it.

The perfect gift.

Or gifts, as it were.

Harry tripped on a loose Galleon on the floor, lost her balance, and collided face first with a stack of… books. When she'd coughed away most of the dust, she looked down to find a pile of ancient, centuries-old looking books. And as she followed the trail of them, she saw dozens more, precariously stacked in haphazard towers. Some are so old they're hand written, passed down for generations through her family—epic tales of lost treasures and knowledge, tossed away to live forever in the back of the family vault.

Harry smiles, bursting out of the vault and scaring the little goblin snoozing by the door.

"Hi, excuse me," she says, brightly, "Do you perhaps have a bag? A very large one, at that?"

**13.**

She has two perfect gifts for two occasions—but absolutely no idea what to say to him when she returns home.

For a moment, she wishes she had taken Hermione up on her offer and just spent the night again at her house. Harry has never been one to procrastinate though (on things not regarding schoolwork, that is) and had instead portkeyed back to the Riddle Mansion, standing on the porch without a single plan in place.

It's as still as a tomb inside, and Harry looks around warily, wondering when the portentous inhabitant of the manor would reveal himself. He is most certainly here, but she can't sense where, exactly.

She wanders around the first floor, growing more and more nervous the longer she goes without seeing him. She finally rounds the whole thing, and heads to the second. She finds him in the drawing room, hands clasped behind his back, turned towards the window. For all intent purposes, he looks to be calmly, casually stargazing.

But there is nothing casual about the Dark Lord—or calm, for that matter.

"Um," she stammers, after moments of silence, when it becomes clear he won't speak first. "Hi."

He turns around, completely unreadable.

Harry all at once remembers the last time she'd looked upon this face—remembers exactly what those lips felt like against hers. She looks down quickly, utterly terrified, wringing her hands in her scarf so violently she worried it might just tear apart.

"Um," she says again, intelligently, fixating studiously on the floorboards, trying to make herself say something—_anything._

She hears him step closer, and fear seems to seep into the very calendar of her bones. She notes, almost absently, that she is trembling ever so slightly. He draws closer; her breath catches in her lungs and seems to burn corrosively through everything, her heart, her limbs, every single finger and toe. She can't remember the last time she' d been so scared of him.

Harry closes her eyes, completely unable to handle whatever is coming.

She's not sure what she was expecting—a very awkward and horrible reprimand, mostly. Or nothing at all, just the swish of his robes as he leaves the room without a comment or backwards glance.

A large, warm hand comes to rest atop her head, tugging her softly until she can feel the soft, silky fabric of his robes.

He takes a breath, and Harry has never before felt this kind of fear.

"You silly child," he reprimands, but there is nothing in his tone but affection. "What are you so afraid of?"

She squeezes her eyes shut. "I…" This is utterly unbearable.

"Do you hate me?" She asks, in a pathetically small voice.

"Hate you?" He murmurs. "Why do you think I hate you?"

And how is she supposed to answer that? Is he really going to make her say it out loud? This must be what it feels like to die from spontaneous combustion via an implosion of embarrassment. When she chances a glance at his face, she doesn't see any anger there at all. In fact, he looks almost… amused?

The thought hits her like a stab to the chest. Does he think this is funny? Is he deriving amusement out of this? Why wouldn't he, she thinks, hollow and miserable. It must seem rather funny to him—a silly little girl having a crush on him. Did he tell all his death eaters? Did they laugh about it after?

She pulls away, bitter, with an ache in her chest that is more painful than she could ever have imagined it to be.

"Never mind," she bites out, caustically. "What does it matter, anyway?"

He looks down at her, surprised by the bite in her voice. Harry jerks out of his grip while he's distracted, refusing to look him in the eye as she turns away.

"Harry," he says, but even the small bit of concern in his voice is not enough to stop her.

The hand on her shoulder, however, does.

She spins around, ready to tell him off, but there is an unguarded tenderness that crumbles whatever vehement retorts she may have had. And then she has no time to think up any others, because all the thoughts fly out of her head at the touch of his lips against hers.

There's a split second in which she stays perfectly still, immobile with surprise, before she's kissing him back with just as much insistency.

It is both infinitely better and worse than she'd thought it would be. Better, because that brief kiss from before was nothing like the overwhelming and unrelenting intensity of the lips upon her—and a lot worse, because she can't stop shaking and she thinks her heart will pound out of her chest and she feels very light-headed and oh god, she really hopes she doesn't faint from snogging the Dark Lord.

But it's not really her fault; he is… a very talented kisser. And she's never kissed anyone like this. It's all so overwhelming.

She thinks he might be trying to ensnare her soul right out of her mouth—it might actually be working.

He pulls away then, much to her distinct displeasure. But only to move those talented lips to her hair, kissing his way until his warm breath is in her ear, sending shivers all the way to her toes.

"_What do you want, Harry?"_

How is she supposed to answer when she's so thoroughly distracted? She can't come up with a coherent response, so instead she pulls him towards her again, intent on dragging another debauching kiss from him. She has to reach up on her tip-toes, barely tall enough to press her trembling lips to his. It is so sweet and delicate, not at all like the one before, but equally as overwhelming. The soft innocence does not last for long; he backs her against something, and then suddenly she's losing her balance and falling onto—

The drawing room table. She has no time for surprise; his mouth is upon her, hot and insistent, burning against the lines of her throat. He trails up to her ear, coaxing a shuddering gasp from her lips. And then that gifted tongue is moving to her lips, and she opens for him, yielding, and it becomes difficult to think again. But even his mouth cannot distract her from his hands, wandering up and down her legs, flirting with the hem of her skirt; not demanding or invasive, but enough to remind her of what this means, what she's gotten herself into, what intimate acts inevitably follow.

The long, elegant fingers slip under, skimming lightly; a restless uncertainty douses the grip of her latent desire. And without her utterly distracting arousal she finds a tiny bit of fear replacing it— a niggling unease at the thought of going any farther. Does he want to? But then, isn't this what every boy wants (according to Hermione), the reason they kiss you in the first place, why they initiate intimacy at all? And if she doesn't want to, what will he do? Leave? Get annoyed? Do it anyway?

He pauses then, as if sensing her hesitation.

"Harry," he murmurs, warm and indulgent. Though the light pads of his fingers flitter against her skin, they don't move any farther.

She makes a little noise in the back of her throat. The touch scares her as much as it excites her.

"What do you want?" He asks again, and something very close to relief washes away all her concerns.

She says the first thing she thinks of. She's nervous, yes, but that does not at all mean she wants him to leave.

"Come to bed with me," she says, and her embarrassment once her words catch up to her is almost worth the unadulterated astonishment crossing his face. "Not like that!" She reiterates hastily, burying her face into his shoulder. "I mean, I just…" She squeezes him tightly, as if the touch could possibly convey all she wants to say.

_I don't want to let you go. _

He cuts her off before she can dig herself any deeper, holding her firmly, and then they're somehow sliding through time and space.

Wherever they end up is besotted in a cloying, unending darkness. She doesn't mind at all. She falls into a silken ocean, dragging him down with her. It's all too easy to forget about the entire world beyond the touch of his lips; whatever diminutive universe blooms in the spaces between their lips is one she wants to exist in forever.

He kisses her until she thinks she's forgotten how to breathe properly—or think, for that matter. She feels lost in the cage of his arms, pinned to the bed, gasping for air whenever they break apart. He keeps one hand against her thigh, crumpling the fabric there, rubbing against the small, intimate strip of skin above her stockings, but before the hem of her skirt. It makes something fearful cling to her throat, but also sinks into her stomach with a liquid heat she doesn't know what to do with.

"Harry," he murmurs, but she only buries herself into the lines of his shoulder, unwilling to respond, or try to have a conversation at all. She doesn't think herself capable of it right now.

She doesn't know when she drifts off, but it's somewhere between the heavy beating of her racing heart and the warmth of the body above her, so hot she thinks its consuming her very soul.

**28.**

She blinks upon him, sleepily, doused in sun; lashed and insatiable essences in barborous gold. There are four insignificant freckles, curved around her eye as a vigilant constellation that always manage to elicit his complete attention. Absurdly, he finds himself fixating upon them now. The world is a gray and melancholy waste around her, unsubstantial, unremarkable and wholly unguessed by the eye.

"_Tom_," she murmurs, thick with dreams. Her eyes drift closed; spiky shadows dance across her cheeks with the flittering lashes.

For a timeless moment, everything is still and undisturbed; white washed light caught in an endless hold; wandering hair a pool of fire beneath her, tangled in his fingers; a dust mote flutters by her nose, a subdued glow; a small, almost insignificant smile touches her lips.

"Happy Christmas, Tom," The smile grows into something infinitely more beautiful and dangerous—it will ruin him if he's not careful, he knows.

But he's already been careless.

**14.**

Harry emerges reluctantly from her dreams, blinking into an indeterminable sunlight and feeling as if she has forgotten something very important in them. But she can no longer remember anything about them, aside from snippets of color, light and sound.

She closes her eyes again, turning in her sheets, nosing in against the remaining heat of her pillow.

Except this is definitely not her pillow.

A gentle warmth flickers in her heart when her eyes open to the great Dark Lord himself, pliant and indulgent beneath her. He is awake, deeply contemplating the ceiling above them. For a moment, all she wants to do is watch him in the early morning light, far too comfortable to even contemplate moving. Something delighted thrills in her chest when she thinks that he's here with her, right now. That he stayed. Harry smiles slowly, closing her eyes and burying her face into his shoulder.

He peers down curiously.

"It's Christmas," she turns her smile into his robes.

"Yes," he agrees, distant, and not sounding at all enthused.

She lifts her head up, feeling rather giddy as she presses her lips to his again, and he allows her, tongue shyly licking against him. When she pulls away he appears in marginally better spirits. A thought occurs to her with a frown.

"You don't like Christmas?" She looks haltingly toward him.

The Dark Lord sits up from beneath her, and something both like fear and anticipation coils inside of her when he looms above her, something burning and hot lingering in his eyes as he looks down upon her.

"It has it's advantages," he answers, elusive.

"Does it?" She murmurs, finding herself drawn to his lips. It's strange; she never thought much of kissing before. But now it's as if that's the only thing she can think about. "What… exactly is an advantage?"

He lowers himself down to her; she stays very still, breathless.

"I find it makes people far more… _charitable_," he replies, but she is barely paying attention.

"Charitable?" She echoes, absent, quiet and distracted by his mouth, so close to her own.

"Yes," he agrees, with a dark smile. Something lurches in her heart at the very sight of it—a foreign, inexplicable heat pooling in her stomach. "They are much more agreeable to do what you ask… willing to indulge a small favor, or two—if given the right incentive."

Harry shivers with the promise in his words. "I see," she whispers; an intangible wisp against his mouth. "What kind of incentives are we talking about here?"

"I'm sure I could come up with a few." And then that dark smile is pressed against her own, lightly, enough to make her eyes flutter shut but not enough to ease the restless heat inside of her. "I wonder, Harry… what kind of incentive might I need, to elicit a small favor from you?"

"Hmm…?" The lips move away, and her eyes open, reluctant.

He looms above her, dark and dangerous and doing horrible things to her heart. "W—Well that would depend," she whispers, faltering. "On, um…" her breath hitches; his mouth lowers to her neck, searing a line of fire down to the her chest. "What—what kind of favor you're asking for..."

His fingers slip through the collar of her shirt, every so slightly, exposing bare inches for his perusing mouth, igniting every nerve it passes by. His lips worship the downy, smooth skin he uncovers with every pass of his fingers; the shallow dips and shadows, the indent of her collar.

"I'm sure you won't be too adverse to it," he murmurs, silkily, and then there is no more room between them for conversation.

.

.

Harry murmurs with disappointment when his fingers stop threading through her hair, feeling cold with the loss of them. He indulges her again, a bemused look to his face as he resumes his petting. Harry approves.

She feels sleepy and warm and very comfortable, and is besieged with a great unwillingness to move—possibly for forever. In front of her he holds a book with one hand, the other running through her hair. She doesn't know what this one is about, but she is completely unsurprised to see him reading a book once more; it is so very similar to the Tom Riddle in her dreams, who almost always has his nose in a book.

Her eyes slide closed again, and she must drift off for some time because then he is nudging her awake; not with annoyance but great amusement.

"Harry," he says, and there is a little thrill in her chest when she hears the fondness in his voice. "How long do you plan to sleep on me?"

"Forever," she says in response, burying her nose in the fabric of his robes and studiously ignoring him.

"Or perhaps just until lunch?"

The thought of food rouses her from her cozy slumber, and she mutters insensibly as she rises from his lap, yawning and pawing flimsily at her eyes.

"Lunch, then," she pouts, mutinous, but follows him to the dining room anyway.

She's reminded that its Christmas when she's greeted with the traditional Christmas fair, laid out upon the table in amounts far too large for the both of them. The house elves must have gotten excited for this one. Harry blinks rapidly at it, coming out of her blissful daze at the thought.

"Oh!" She jumps up from her chair, almost arbitrarily.

Lord Voldemort looks up, curious.

"Hold on," she says, quickly, "I just—oh I completely forgot—

And with that utterly unintelligible statement, Harry is out the door like a bolt of lightning. He watches her dart out of the room with surprise, before ultimately deciding it is far too difficult to attempt to rationalize the mind of a teenage girl. They are illogical and irrational and… have a way of surprising you. He smiles darkly at the memory of sweet little Harry, the only one to have ever dared interrupt him when he is speaking, pressing her lips to his as she stands on her tiptoes. Very surprising indeed.

She skitters back into the room, grinning brightly.

It drifts away at the sight of him, but only to emerge again as something soft and reticent.

"Tom," she draws close to him, shyly, almost—nervously.

He looks at her, curious—not prepared at all when she reveals a small little box wrapped in perfect silver wrapping paper, an equally perfect bow of illustrious gold ribbon tied at the top. He knows what it is, by definition at least. It's a present. A Christmas present. He's gotten a few over the years, many from his followers; none have ever elicited such emotion as this one does.

She leans in close, pressing an innocent little kiss to the side of his mouth. "Merry Christmas," she whispers against his lips.

Harry watches anxiously as he carefully unwinds the bow and peels off the paper. She's never been so concerned over someone's reaction to one of her gifts. But then, it's Tom. Of course it means more to her.

"A soul gem," he remarks when he opens the box, looking somewhat surprised.

She nods, moving close enough to place her hand over his, until he can smell her lilting scent and feel the silky drift of hair slipping from her shoulders, brushing against him.

She takes his hand, drawing the stone up to the light.

His eyes widen when it flashes a deep crimson when it hits upon the sunlight, glinting between its original slate coloring and the searing red. He's never made one himself, but he's read about them in a variety of texts. They're innocuous enough; personal, but not particularly useful. He's very sure they're not supposed to change colors. They're rocks; and though some can be great and striking colors, they are all just stones at the end of the day.

Not this one, though.

"Watch," she whispers, lowering it back down into the shadows beneath the table. This time when the light glints off of it, it turns to a bright emerald.

This is even more surprising.

"It's neat, right?" She enthuses, excited. "No one else's did that."

But of course they didn't, he thinks silently.

None of them share a soul with someone else.

It doesn't escape his notice that this gem is a physical representation of both of them. He imagines if he ever had to go through the tedious process of making one of his own, it would look the exact same as hers. It is, however, just a rock. But all the same he's almost… touched that she's entrusting them with it. They're usually precious treasures that are kept within the family, perhaps lauded in some ostentatious glass case as the Malfoy's have them, or in a Gringott's vault with other heirlooms.

The thought strikes him, then.

Harry is his. She is the closest thing he's ever had to family.

.

.

The thought makes him pensive and maudlin for the rest of the day—although to be honest, everything about this Christmas has him quiet and thoughtful. In his school years, Christmas at Hogwarts was always a muted, lonely affair, celebrated with the sparse inhabitants of the castle that stayed for the holidays. Though even that was an exaggeration; nothing about it was ever all that celebratory, especially in regards to him. And in his later years as he traveled the world he never bothered to celebrate it at all; he had learned to scorn this holiday, as he did all others. He eventually had to tolerate it during his first rise to power, but he had never come to truly enjoy it.

He's not particularly sure if he's enjoying it now, either.

But Harry always makes for pleasant company—the only company he cares for, really—so this is not to say he is as dispirited and annoyed with this day as he usually is.

It is certainly a different experience, though.

The day is a quiet, subdued affair—but not lonely. If anything, it is somewhat comforting. He returns to the main floor to find a heap of presents and a small army of owls perched in the large front foyer; it doesn't surprise him at all to see that Harry is well received by her peers.

She tucks herself in next to him as he lounges in the study, book in hand, diligently plucking away at her sea of presents. He notices that she left many of them out in the entrance room—she only opens the ones that are from people she knows, she said. And yet the amount is still alarming.

He finds himself unwillingly curious; it soon turns into confusion and a general sense of exasperation when he sees just what exactly the contents are. Again, they aren't necessarily surprising. That said, he doesn't think he's ever seen so many beauty products all in one place in his life, or jewelry, for that matter. It strikes him then that he didn't get her anything at all—but Harry does not seemed concerned with this.

She seems more than content, actually; he catches her smiling at him at odd hours, for no reason at all; she steals kisses from him sporadically and intermittently, without much rhyme or reason. As if the fancy simply overtakes her. He has never been the recipient of this kind of attention before, but it is not… unwanted. Strange, yes, but not unwelcomed.

She spells all the torn wrapping paper away, turning around with an expression that makes all the thoughts fly from his head.

Harry wanders over to him, smiling shyly. Why is she doing that? Does she not understand who he is? A lovely young girl like Harry—she could have anyone she wanted. She must be the apple of every eye at Hogwarts, of this he has no doubt. The thought stirs within him a low grade level of fury; there are probably dozens of boys panting after her, and he knows exactly what they're thinking. It mollifies him slightly to know that she is only looking at him right now, but does nothing to answer his questions. Why does she—how could she possibly—?

But then the impossible child is crawling into his lap, gently tilting his head up to place a quiet kiss upon his mouth, and it comes to him then that it doesn't matter _why._ The point is that she is here, and there is no way he will ever let her go.

.

.

.

**15.**

The days pass in an intermittent haze of calming quiet, with the occasional stolen kisses. She's a bit unhappy with the fact that it hasn't gotten much farther than that. No matter how insistent she is, he always pries her fingers away before she can get anywhere with them.

Harry pouts.

He acts as if everyone else in her year isn't doing this already. And now that she's gotten used to it—more than used to it—she finds herself wanting more. She already pointed this out to him, but it didn't do her much good. The dark lord does not care at all about what is in vogue for teenage girls.

Her birthday present for him arrives, and she has a merry time assembling it to surprise him—and then promptly forgets about the whole thing after a half hour or so of distracting him from his work, plopped onto his office desk and making a delightful nuisance of herself. He tells her as much when he finally pulls away, grabbing her hands before they can even reach his robes, as if finally realizing where all the time has gone.

"You're doing this on purpose," he accuses, sending her a baleful look.

In response, she smiles up at him, blinking in innocence even as she hooks her legs tighter against him, wiggling around just to be spiteful. "Doing what?"

He releases her hands to still her hips, but then she immediately uses her freed appendages to move for the top clasp of his cloak. He growls, grabbing them again and then throwing her down onto the desk, pinning them above her head. "Proving to be a pest." He replies. "If you continue, I will lock you up in the room."

"The bedroom?" She clarifies, excited. "Will you be joining me?"

He makes a strangled noise, dropping his head onto her shoulder. "You are far too young to even be aware of any of that. What sort of things do they teach you in that school?"

"No I'm not!" She protests, hotly. "And everyone I know is always talking about—

But he shuts her up with a firm kiss to the mouth. After a minute or two, the fight has left her and she is once again melting thoughtlessly under his incredibly talented tongue, completely forgetting what they were even arguing about. The dark lord is perhaps even quite pleased with this new predicament he's found himself in; at the very least, he has discovered a way to both distract her and stop her incessant whining that, incidentally, is pleasurable for the both of them.

She is blissful and compliant for the rest of the day, content to sprawl across him and read her insipid and unproductive books. This is, perhaps, the best birthday he has ever had. He often forgets that this day is his birthday at all, far too caught up in his work to remember a date that he considers meaningless.

It is only when he looks up to check the time does he notice something amiss in the library.

Something against a bare strip of wall scintillates with magic; a poorly conjured invisibility spell, for he can feel the magic quite easily. He immediately becomes concerned—who could have possibly been able to conjure it? And what sort of malicious violence was waiting to ensnare him on the other side? He does not let anyone into the Manor, aside from the drawing room or office, and the dungeons. He has no wish for any of them to discover Harry, or for Harry to discover them. Still, the only ones who use this mansion in anything approaching regularity are him and—

He turns an accusing, angry look to the girl lying upon the couch.

"Harry," he starts, very slowly, but she immediately hears the danger in his tone. Harry looks up at him with wary eyes, lowering her book slowly.

"Yes?" She replies, timid.

"Would you like to tell me what you've done to the study?"

Harry blinks at him, uncomprehending. And then she gasps, leaping to her feet. The dark lord scowls, most displeased. He is imagining a great many irritating things she could have done—has she blown a hole through the wall, and is trying to cover it up from him? But then she is tugging him forward, with a giddiness that surprises him.

"I haven't done anything bad, I promise, so don't be angry."

"Is that supposed to reassure me?"

"Close your eyes," she demands, in an excited whisper.

His frown grows. "Harry—

"Please?" She pouts, leaning up to steal a kiss from him, as if she thinks this might make him more amenable to her games.

It works.

He gives a long suffering sigh. "If I must," he gives a grand capitulation. She smiles, and then releases him to point her wand towards the wall.

He feels magic tingle in the air as she pulls down whatever half-managed wards she had hiding the wall, and then she is telling him to open his eyes.

At first, he is confused. He doesn't see anything all that different. Except, there is a bookshelf that hadn't been there before, full of books that are unfamiliar to him. Harry is watching him with big, anticipatory eyes, that grow wider when he draws closer for deeper inspection. They aren't familiar to him—at all. He's never even heard of most of these titles, and some don't have any at all. A few jump out at him; ancient texts that he has never quite been able to get his hands on. Books from centuries ago that are now only obscure references in other things he's read. Some of these are quite dark—archaic, black magic, so evil he cannot imagine how they came to be in Harry's possession.

"Harry," he begins, in barely a whisper, taken by complete surprise. "What is this?"

She brightens immediately, reaching up one her toes to kiss him softly. When she pulls away, she smiles quietly at him. "Your birthday present, silly."

No one has ever called him 'silly' before, at least not that he can remember. And if they had, he surely put them under the _cruciatus _for it. But he cannot feel anything but complete, conclusive shock. No one has ever given him a birthday present, either.

He swallows, thickly. "You… where did you get this?"

"My Gringotts vault!" She enthuses, as if that isn't at all shocking. "There were so many of them—I didn't know anyone else who would appreciate it."

"Your Gringotts vault?" he repeats, slowly. She nods. "Harry, these are heirlooms," he finds himself explaining, because it is clear she does not understand the value of them. "Family heirlooms," he adds, if the former explanation is unclear.

She blinks. "I know." She shrugs. "But I'm never going to use them. You'd probably find them more useful than me."

"Yes," this is invariably true; Harry is incapable of reading anything with more substance than overly-imaginative stories about a space pirate and his shaggy dog. Or maybe it's a bear. This is beside the point. "But these are yours, Harry. They belong to your family—you can't just give them away."

"Why not?" She ripostes, sounding genuinely confused.

Harry walks closer to him, until she can wind her arms around him. "I want you to have them," she whispers, tugging him closer, until she can fit herself into the crook of his shoulder, her nose cold against his neck. "I want to give them to you."

"Harry…" He doesn't think she truly knows what she's giving him, but he feels strangely touched all the same. "These aren't the sort of things you give away."

But he is reminded once more that, like him, Harry comes from a very prestigious and illustrious lineage that she had never even been aware of until recently. She doesn't understand the value of it, nor is she aware of the traditions that are so prevalent in pureblood society. The Malfoys, for one, would never, even upon certainty of death, give away their treasured books and scrolls. The Malfoy library undoubtedly has texts that have been long lost to the rest of the wizarding world for centuries, squirreled and hidden away for only the Malfoy family to see.

And though the Gaunts had long since squandered away whatever palatial fortune they may have once had, he knows that the Potters did not. She had a grandfather, once, the patriarch of her family; she had a family manor that was most likely full of family treasures; so many timeless and precious heirlooms for only her eyes to see.

All he had left of his inheritance was a locket, and even that had been squandered away before he was born. This might be all she has left of hers.

"Why not?" She frowns, curiously.

He searches her gaze, so unguarded and trusting. He could steal these away from her so easily, and she would never know the wiser. He's certainly done it before, to others who were so naive; he's not sure why the idea has lost its appeal—that it disturbs him, even.

"Harry," he sighs, "these have been a part of your family for longer than you've most likely even had a family tree. It's your inheritance; they are heirlooms. They belong in your family—you can't just give them away."

She doesn't respond for some time, though she holds his gaze unerringly. It doesn't surprise him; she has always been the only person who could ever hold his gaze, without fear or trepidation.

"But you _are_ my family," she replies, at length. Her eyes are wide and beseeching and—fearful. There is a flicker of terror that flitters through her features, though it is so very different than any he's ever seen before. It is not a fear for her life, or a fear of him. "I'm yours… right? That's what you said; that we have a connection."

His mouth opens, but he finds himself completely lacking coherent thought.

He _had_ said that.

And had he not been thinking something similar only a few days ago? She is his. He is so deeply and irrevocably a part of her that there is no way to refute this.

His hand reaches up to her forehead, smoothing slowly against her rampant hair, brushing against the scar so prevalent on the unblemished skin.

Perhaps she is right. She shares his very soul; he does not think there is a more intimate connection to exist.

Even blood.

"Yes," he agrees, barely above a whisper. His eyes darken as he trails a possessive hand down her cheek. "You are mine."

She shivers delightfully, reaching towards him with an eagerness that surprises him. It is not long before his possessiveness gets the better of him, and he is succumbing to his desire.

The argument is forgotten soon enough, the rest of the world crumbling away until it is only the two of them, two parts of the same soul, whole once again.

**29.**

There is a darkness in him; she can feel it, an endless danger just underneath his skin. Can feel it wash over her, as she lingers in his embrace. A darkness that has always been here, perhaps, but has grown into a deep, besotted miasma that is almost overwhelming sometimes.

It doesn't escape her that she has noticed it far more than she ever has before. That his magic calls out to her in a way that no other magic does. That she can feel each and every horcrux; their location, what they are, how many. Dumbledore would probably kill for this kind of information—maybe she really is the only person capable of vanquishing him.

The intimate darkness has seeped into her, becoming a part of her the longer she stays in his presence. It's changed him, she thinks. A piceous veil that has slipped between them, separating them, even now.

"Tom," she whispers, as he sinks into her, biting burning kisses into her neck. She winces at the sudden intrusion, at the pace he sets soon thereafter.

He doesn't respond. His hands have left dark marks in her hip, his mouth has left even more. He is rough and unrelenting—he's taken her three times today, each more insistent than the last.

There's a black aura that tingles on her skin; a viperous look in his eye and a fear that feels foreign crawling up her spine.

"_Tom,"_ she repeats, urgently.

He doesn't appear to be listening. That talented mouth moves to hers, teeth scraping against her bottom lip, leaving it swollen and red. His grip grows tighter, and he's thrusting into her almost uncontrollably—aggressively.

She pries her mouth away from his, her hands moving to push him away. "Tom, stop it, you're hurting me!"

He blinks down at her, the haze leaving his eyes as he takes her in. From his expression, she probably looks as bad as she feels; sore and achy and littered with bruises.

"_Harry_," he murmurs, almost apologetically, stilling inside of her. He leans down, slowly, pressing soft kisses into her hair.

She doesn't respond, closing her eyes as she heaves for breath, finally having a moment to calm her racing heart.

"Are you—" his gaze trails down her, concerned, full of a fear of his own. "Did I—

She shakes her head, pulling him down to meet her lips. "No, it's okay—I'm fine," she reassures, relieved that he's snapped out of whatever malevolence had held him. The guilt is almost just as bad though, even if it is relieving to see.

She moves against him then, slow and sweet, drawing a groan from him. "I want it like this," she whispers, lowly, purring into his ear. "I want you to make love to me slowly, until I can't take it anymore, until I'm begging for you to go faster—

The guilt is besieged with a look of intense desire, and he is surging into her so slowly that it makes her toes curl, doing as she asked. Almost too soon it becomes far too much, and she really is begging him to go faster, hurtling head long into oblivion. He follows her after a few moments, holding her so tight she thinks he might be breaking something. His grip relaxes as he sighs into her hair, and Harry feels herself slip into a languid, sleepy contentment, warm and comfortable in his arms. Like this, it is all too easy to forget whatever lies beyond the morning, the reality she'll have to come to terms with when the light strips away the quiescent night. The darkness that grows deeper still, even now.

He shifts against her, and she makes a noise of discontent. "_Don't pull out_," she murmurs; he stills, blinks down at her. "_I want to feel you_."

A dark look crosses his eyes, but it's gone as quick as it had come. Her eyes flutter shut soon enough, and she's drifting off, sleepy and satisfied. He says something to her, in that moment, and the words wander in between her dreams.

She can't remember them when she wakes up.

**16.**

_I must not tell lies._

Harry bites her lip furiously, ignoring the words, and the pain. They're not actually what's bothering her—it's the woman in front of her, giggling away as she pours copious amounts of sugar into her tea. Around her, ornate portraits of cats meow away obnoxiously. Harry has the intense urge to explode each and every one of them, and then destroy the woman in front of her.

Somehow she manages to keep it together long enough to hold out through detention.

She swoops into her dormitory with a bang, near shaking violently with anger. The only thing that keeps her from destroying the whole room is the letter waiting for her on her night stand.

Tom.

Something bright and warm besieges all her anger, dragging it out like a waning tide at sea until its just a mere memory.

Harry settles herself onto her bed, quill in hand—a real one, this time. She takes a moment to simply look at his lovely script. It reminds her of the writing in the diary, but it's a bit different; still infinitely better penmanship than her own. But then, of course Lord Voldemort's penmanship is impeccable, how could it possibly be anything else?

But penmanship reminds her of what she was doing not even ten minutes ago. She scowls, shaking the thought away.

"_Dear Tom_…" They always start innocuously enough, but they've become long-winded conversations about all sorts of magic—any little thought or curiosity she's ever had he indulges, anything she's ever dreamed of knowing, even about himself. That she hadn't expected; it's true, she knows most of it already, and she's sure he probably knows hers just as intimately. But she's amazed that he would speak of it at all.

They have… far more in common than she's comfortable admitting. It is uncanny, actually, how similar they are.

Yet, it is equally uncanny how much they don't.

It is painfully glaring to see what has been erased from each and every memory he explains through. He speaks of academics triumphs, berating the professors for their inability to teach him anything meaningful. Of his peers who were so shallow and easily manipulated. He had no friends, no indulgences; nothing at all but a stewing anger and loneliness, and an insecurity she doesn't think ever really left him, buried deep under layers of cruelty and callousness. He didn't have a Ron or Hermione, who are there for her through thick and thin. He doesn't have the Weasley's, who shower her with warmth and love and _belonging._

He never had anywhere to belong.

That's not true anymore, she thinks, vehemently. He does. He has her. That has to count for something, right?

Harry jolts upright then, hissing in pain as she shakes out her hand. She'd been thinking so deeply she'd clenched it into a fist, and it has begun to burn as if she had held it over a hot stove.

She looks down at where she left off in her letter, scowling.

"_Why must you have cursed the defense position?" _She writes, rather mutinously, on a different tangent than her abysmal potions grade they had been talking about prior, "_You can't really blame me for my 'lack of education' when you look at the track record for that post. I'll remind you in case you've forgotten; one of them was you on the back of someone's head; the other was a barmy fake with ridiculous hair; another was a death eater in hiding. (To be honest though, Barty Crouch Jr. was actually very good) _

_I'll admit, this one is by far the worst. Her name is Dolores Umbridge—She may possibly be a troll sent from hell to wreak havoc upon the school. She's made it her mission to ruin my life, I think. She's put me in detention five times this week, and I'm pretty sure her detentions are illegal. Unless blood quills have become acceptable forms of punishment have been pulled off the banned list. Hermione said they've been illegal since 1828—is that true? _

_Honestly I think I'd even prefer Professor Snape's detention to this. At least bat eyes don't hurt afterwards. She made me write 'I must not tell lies' over a hundred times today—it's still on my hand! She's absolutely mad."_

.

.

Harry blinks up into the shimmering lights, a wide, wondrous smile upon her face.

She'd been incredibly reluctant to teach all these students, its true, but seeing all the progress they've made. She's starting to enjoy it, actually. It's clear to see she may actually be something of a natural born leader, no matter how vehement she denies this. She doesn't want to be, is the thing.

But she can sort of forget about all that, laughing as Hermione's otter chases Ron's dog around. Luna's rabbit darts around the windows, sprinkling glittering blue light onto the students as it runs past. It's beautiful—they all are.

It is over all too soon.

The room shudders ominously. The cheer and laughter comes to a sudden halt, as they all dart wary looks around the room. The walls shake again, as if something rumbles in the deep. Harry watches in horror as a crack splinters on the wall where the door should be. The crack crawls along the rocks, shaking with the effort of whatever is on the other side. Little Nigel darts forward with her, intent on getting a look. She catches him by the collar, before shoving him back towards the others.

She looks again between the wall and the students, and makes her decision in a split second.

Tom had told her an anecdote once of the invisibility charm, used to render a target area completely invisible. He'd mentioned it offhand when remarking upon the Ministry's uselessness; apparently at a Quidditch match they'd attempted to use one to hide the stadium from the Muggles, but ended up hiding it from everyone else too.

She's never actually attempted it, but…

There is an ominous boom from behind her. Rocks skitter onto the floor as the wall begins to break.

Harry takes a breath. "_Sudarium_," she whispers, and the other students fade right before her eyes.

Another boom, and she throws a _silencio _charm at them as well.

"_Bombarda Maxima_!"

The wall finally gives way, revealing Umbridge in her two-piece pink suit, looking down her nose at her with an expression of disdain. Predictably, Draco Malfoy, leader of the Inquisitorial Squad, is by her side. She scowls at both of them.

"Miss Potter," Umbridge sniffs, narrowed eyes darting around. "I thought I heard others…"

"There are others," Draco insists.

"No, there's just me." Harry retorts coolly.

Umbridge eyes her shrewdly. "And just what are you doing up here locked up in this room by yourself, hm?"

"Practicing my spells," she admits, as if reluctant.

Umbridge's eyes glitter at the admission. "Ah-hah! Practicing spells in the corridors, are we? May I remind you that there is to be no magic in the halls?"

"This isn't a hall." Harry points out, but it goes unheard.

Umbridge shakes her head sadly. "Another misdemeanor, Miss Potter. You are truly quite the delinquent. So sad… such a lovely girl like yourself, unable to become anything more than a common tramp. It's quite tragic."

Harry rolls her eyes.

"With such a lack of manners!" Umbridge adds, offended at her expression. "Follow me now, Miss Potter. You must be punished."

Draco smirks at her as she walks past him, tagging along.

Harry says nothing for the duration of the long walk to Umbridge's office. Draco is a smug presence beside her, and Umbridge totters in front of them, running a litany of insults against her. Harry wants to hex this stupid toad, and briefly considers actually doing it. What does she need school for, anyhow? Tom could probably teach her anything she wanted to learn—and teach her far better than anyone could here.

But this was just a farfetched dream—she would never voluntarily give up Hogwarts.

Her reality is just as farfetched.

Umbridge throws open the door to her office, bodily dragging Harry along. Harry stumbles behind her, running into her when Umbridge halts in her tracks.

"Dolores," comes the low, smooth baritone of Lucius Malfoy.

Harry gapes at him. What the hell is he doing here?

"Father!" Draco is positively beaming. Lucius spares his son a solemn glance, but does not return his excitement.

Oh, that's right. He's the governor of something important. He was there after the debacle in the Chamber of Secrets, wasn't he? She supposes it's not all that surprising to see him at the school, but she doesn't know what to feel nonetheless. Lucius Malfoy is a death eater—a known one, at that. How he slipped his way out of Azkaban she'll never know, but his allegiances don't escape her. He was never 'imperio'd into whatever crimes he committed.

His calculating eyes turn to her, ever so briefly. She freezes in the gaze, returning the look with an expression of wariness. What, exactly, does he know? About her? About the Dark Lord?

Umbridge seems just as excited as Draco, a vicious grin erupting upon her face as she giggles away. "Lucius, how wonderful it is of you to stop by. I've much to show you; I think you'll be quite pleased with the progress the Ministry has made in correcting the violations of this school."

"Is that so?" Lucius raises a brow.

"Oh yes, indeed." Umbridge turns to her, snagging her by the arm and forcing her into her seat. "Young Miss Potter here is a prime example. A lost cause, this one. I'm afraid I might have to resort to more unseemly measures to compensate for it. Such a loss."

Harry can't hide her snort of derision.

Umbridge gasps at her impertinence, tutting as she shakes her head. "Unseemly indeed."

"Unseemly…" Lucius repeats, slowly, almost absently. His eyes are fixed determinably upon her—evaluating her. She swallows.

He knows.

The elder Malfoy ignores the simpering woman, stalking towards Harry with a purpose that surprises her. He catches her arm like a snake lunging at its prey—her left arm. Harry flinches, but his grip is like iron. She watches with incredulity as he pushes her sleeve up, inspecting her arm as if he perhaps thinks she might have the dark mark or something. Has he gone mad?

Draco apparently seems to be thinking something similar. "Um… father…" he stutters.

Lucius looks up, as if finally noticing his son is in the room. "Draco," he barks. "Close that door."

Umbridge squeals with excitement. "I see you've come to the same conclusion as I have, Lucius. She is far beyond redemption; we must—

"Have you ever heard of the torture curse, Dolores?"

She looks positively brimming with anticipation, nodding readily, turning her gleaming eyes towards Harry. "Oh yes, excellent idea, Lucius, I was thinking the exact same thing—

Harry turns a conflicted gaze towards Lucius Malfoy, hands clenching tightly against the arms of the chair, as if debating whether to bolt of fly at them both in a fit of rage. Just try, she thinks, angrily. She can only imagine what sort of retribution Lord Voldemort would have.

Lucius draws his wand.

"—And of course, what Minister Fudge doesn't know can't hurt him—"

"I'm afraid I wasn't referring to Miss Potter." Lucius interrupts, in a voice smooth and dark, laced with an undeniable sense of anticipation.

Dolores sputters, blinking her unnaturally long lashes. "I'm sorry?"

Lucius turns to her with a smile.

"_Crucio,"_

Harry recoils, but nothing comes. Her eyes snap open and she watches in shock as Umbridge falls to the ground with a shriek, seizing violently all over her heinous paisley print carpet. The cats in the portraits begin to meow with terror; Umbridge wails as she flops about on the ground, ruining her outfit and her hair as she flails about, clawing mindlessly at the ground.

It seems like hours before Lucius finally releases the curse—her screams are horrible, and so loud they are deafening. Harry's eyes are wide and fearful as her gaze flickers back to the expressionless man in the center of the room, and the pitiful woman seizing on the floor. Draco actually looks just as terrified, plastering himself against the wall.

Umbridge sobs in a heap on the ground. Lucius spares her a dismissive glance, jabbing her with his cane until she rolls over, as if he doesn't wish for even his boot to touch her.

"Dolores," he greets, raising a brow as he looks down at her. "It seems you are not quite as familiar with it as I had thought you were."

She looks up at him with tearful eyes. "L—Lucius…" She heaves, between sobs. "How could you—

"The Dark Lord sends his felicitations." Lucius interrupts.

It is as if all the air in the room has left, leaving everything cold and quiet. The mere mention of his title has Umbridge freezing up in terror. Her flailing stops. Draco sucks in a horrified breath from his spot against the wall.

Lucius merely raises a cool brow. "Consider this a… gift of commemoration, if you will. I applaud you, quite honestly. You've truly managed to elicit his entire attention—this is quite the feat, you know."

"No…" she whispers. "You lie—Lucius, you lie. The dark lord doesn't exist—

"I think you and I both know I am not." He smiles down at her, indulgent. "There's no need for your denial; ignorance is _so_ unbecoming."

Umbridge staggers to her feet, pointing her wand wildly at the Governor. The elder Malfoy eyes it with amusement. "Why do you think I placed you here, Dolores?" He begins, stalking around her, like a predator around its prey. "Because I liked you?" He scoffed. "Because the Minister asked me to?"

She simpers, blubbering for a response that does not come.

"Or perhaps," he muses aloud. "It was the Dark Lord himself, who wanted you here?"

She makes a strangled noise. Harry actually share her opinion on this, eyes widening with incredulity and surprise.

"No, no—

"You see, the Dark Lord is quite fond of the Minister—he is… most ineffective, and is only helping the Dark Lord with his vehement denial of his existence. This, of course, leaves Dumbledore as his most dangerous enemy—and what better way to cripple him than to place you here, in his own school? To use the very Ministry as his vehicle of attack?"

Umbridge's face is very pale. Her wand shakes violently in her hand, as her mouth opens and closes without retort.

Again, Lucius' gaze flickers to her, and it dawns on her. Harry realizes with a distinct sense of horror that she is the reason for this encounter. Her letter, to Tom.

"However, I'm afraid your usefulness has expired."

"I suggest you leave, Dolores," Lucius advises loftily. "Leave, and hide your pathetic, cowardly self in some pitiful hole for the rest of your life, praying he never finds you."

The portly woman staggers back, losing her balance on her shoe, crashing into her desk. Lucius rounds on her. "For I assure you," he continues, in a voice of velvet. "He _will _find you."

She lets out a squeak of terror.

"You see, the Dark Lord does not like it when people touch what is his." His eyes briefly flicker to Harry, whose breath catches in her throat.

"He _does not like it at all_. And you will find that the Dark Lord's… _displeasure_, is a fate far worse than death."

Umbridge's eyes bulge from her head as she turns towards Harry. Harry ignores her, still staring at Malfoy.

The fat toad looks wildly between the two of them; Lucius Malfoy, poised in the center of the room with an ominous smile, and Harry Potter, a young, pretty little girl, seemingly of no relation to any of this, as if suddenly coming to the obvious conclusion.

She lets out a shriek of terror, and then darts right past them, throwing herself bodily out the door. It opens with a bang, and she slips and falls on her broken heel. This does not deter her, as she scrambles back onto her feet, running for her life. She slips a few more times, as the floor is quite slippery when one is wearing stockings.

Harry doesn't even spare her a glance, her unreserved attention directed towards Mr. Malfoy.

He does not look at her, though.

Instead he turns to his son, with the same cool glare. "You'd best keep that under advisement as well, Draco." He cautions sternly. Draco's terrified gaze shoots towards her. He looks, perhaps, on the verge of tears.

"I—I—" He splutters inelegantly, pressing himself further against the wall. His face has lost all its pallor, as if he has just realized what this might mean for him, her tormentor for over five years. Draco looks at her with an expression as if_ she_ is the Dark Lord—as if he would fall to his knees in front of her and kiss the hem of her robes if she demanded it of him.

"You will not be spared for being my son." He adds, in a decidedly softer tone, as if imploring Draco to understand the severity of this situation.

Severity may be an understatement. After all, Lucius Malfoy just swept into the room and threw an unforgiveable at her teacher, and afterwards threatened her imminent death—and all because she had laid a blood quill on Harry Potter. Because she had dared to touch what belongs to the Dark Lord.

He straightens up at that, settling back into a state of laconic composure. He eyes them both. "I trust I do not have to remind the two of you to use discretion?"

They both shake their heads vehemently.

"Very well." And with that, he moves to follow Dolores' erratic footsteps out the door. But not without pausing in front of her. She watches with curiosity as he procures an envelope from his robes.

"For you," he intones without inflection. "Good day, Miss Potter." And then he swoops out of the room.

Harry stares down at it, already very aware of what it is. She knows just by the color of the envelope—the dark green and silver seal.

She decides Lucius has the right of it, and stands up abruptly. Draco jumps at the sudden movement, but she ignores him, intent on leaving the scene of the crime before someone shows up and realizes that the High Inquisitor and Headmistresses has fled the school—and perhaps the country.

.

.

Hermione and Ron are practically in hysterics (well Hermione is, Ron is on the couch, eating an apple) at her hour alone with Professor Umbridge. Because they have a crowd, she puts on her most smug expression and simply says they won't be seeing any more of Umbridge any time soon. Fortunately, everyone is too excited about the prospect of never again seeing the hideous pink toad to look too deeply on how her disappearance came to be in the first place.

Harry tells Hermione later that evening, after they have squirreled away under her bed curtains.

"_Lucius Malfoy_?" Hermione balks, loudly. She sucks in a breath, darting her head around, before she remembers that Harry already casted a silencing charm.

Harry nods.

"He threw a—a- _cruciatus _curse at Umbridge?" Hermione repeats.

Harry nods again.

She leans back, stunned. And then, after a beat; "Merlin, what I would have given to see that."

Harry chokes on a surprised bark of laughter. She would not have expected that from her bookish friend.

"Honestly, I know it's awful of me, but I can't find it in me to feel sorry for her. I would have done it myself if I could have—and believe me, there were moments when I thought I could."

"Oh, I believe you." Harry grins. "I would have been there right with you."

Hermione bursts into laughter at that, setting her off as well. But the mood darkens quickly after that, the both of them sobering up at the realization of what this means.

"He's more than back," Hermione says at length. "He already has so much power… in the Ministry, and even here."

Harry says nothing to this.

Hermione shakes her head with a sigh. "Well, at least this time he's done something I can approve of."

Harry isn't so sure she can agree.

She bids Hermione a good night as they both settle in for bed. The room is still buzzing from excitement over the realization that Umbridge is finally gone. She can still hear them singing 'Ding Dong, the Witch's dead' down in the common room, even though she's fairly sure most of them don't even know where that comes from. But Harry can't stop thinking about Lucius Malfoy's parting words:

_He will find you._

Harry knows he's right. She'd heard rumors that Igor Karkaroff has fled from Durmstrang and gone into hiding; in fear of what the Dark Lord will do to him when he finds the traitor that willingly betrayed his fellow Death Eaters to the Ministry. But she doesn't doubt that Voldemort will find him eventually. And she doesn't doubt that he'll find Umbridge, too. Harry wonders; will Umbridge be down in the dungeons next time she goes home, rotting away in a cell, begging for death? All because she'd punished Harry with a blood quill? Because—she had dared to touch what belongs to the Dark Lord?

Harry peers down at the scar. Already it is fading, but the scar in her head still burns unpleasantly with his anger. The mere thought of someone marking her has him utterly livid with fury. Merlin, Lucius is right. What would Voldemort do if she relayed to him what Draco's done to her over the years? She despises Draco, this is true, but she doesn't think she could condemn him to death.

Harry swallows.

Condemn him to death—like she's done with Umbridge.

.

.

The school year trudges on in a most torturous manner. Voldemort haunts her every waking thought; Tom Riddle haunts the world of her dreams. It's impossible to escape him. Every night, memories of a lonely boy erupt behind her eye. He has already murdered so many people—the poor girl in the bathroom, the inhabitants of Riddle Manor. In his possession is a diary and a ring; they are prized above all else. Like Harry, they all contain a part of his soul. A horcrux. That's what they all are: horcruxes.

She was a little shocked at first, and also, to her complete embarrassment, a little jealous. A tiny bit of resentment spikes within her, even when she reminds herself it's stupid of her to get jealous of an object. An _object_, for Merlin's sake. But she had thought she was the only thing in this whole world that held a part of his soul—what if he held the other horcruxes in higher regard? She knows that's ridiculous. None of them are alive, for one; they can't touch him like she can; can't make him come undone beneath their caressing fingers; they can't press their lips against him, tasting every seam and indent, the hollow of his neck, the lines of his shoulder.

Though to that end, they also can't: talk back, trail mud into the house, disrupt him when he's working, accidentally flood the bathroom, forget to put things back where they found them—

She scowls. Alright, so there are definitely some benefits to having a horcrux in an object rather than a person.

The point remains that there _are _other objects that house pieces of his soul, and who knows how many of them there are. Tom Riddle does not appear to have any intentions of stopping at two; he is wholly fixated on his horcruxes and his immortality.

Meanwhile, Voldemort is as equally fixated upon some elusive blue orb stuck in the Ministry.

His feelings will drift over her at odd hours during the day; mostly they are brief touches of excitement, or anger. But lately they've been images and thoughts; there is something he is hunting obsessively for, and it's in the Ministry.

"A blue orb?" Hermione repeats, when she quietly relays this to her in the library.

Harry nods. "Yeah, about this big," she motions with her hands, "and it sort of glows, a bit. But the real strange part is—whenever he thinks about it, he also thinks about _me_."

"At the same time?" Hermione clarifies. She nods again. "As if he's connecting it to you."

"That's what I think too." Harry agrees. "But I just don't know why."

Hermione bites her lip, silent for a moment. "Those prisoners… the ones from Azkaban. Was it—?"

Harry sighs, looking down where she's wringing her tie in her hands. She drops them when she notices. "Yeah." She admits, flat and toneless. "That was him."

"What do you think he's trying to do?" Hermione whispers, fearfully.

Harry shakes her head. "I dunno." She frowns pensively. "But it must have something to do with that orb—and…"

_And the war_, she thinks but doesn't say. It seems so inevitable, suddenly. The Order has regrouped, the Death Eaters have been broken out of Azkaban. Hermione doesn't call her out on her sudden silence, nodding and returning to her books.

Her best friend goes to work almost immediately, vehemently searching through book after book in an attempt to find out what it could possibly be. Harry tries to tell her to slow down, at least for the sake of her health, but Hermione seems to have made it a personal quest at this point. Best to leave her to it, then.

The days stretch by, languid and leisurely, and Hermione and Harry aren't any closer to finding out what it is.

And Voldemort's excitement only seems to grow as the days go by. He's getting closer to finding that blue orb. Harry is very concerned with whatever plot he's schemed to get it—she can only imagine the destruction it'll cause.

Incidentally it's Ron who finds the answer, and he didn't even find it, technically.

He already knew it.

"A prophecy," he says, like that was the most obvious answer in the world.

Both Harry and Hermione give him incredulous looks, before they tug him closer by his tie. He sputters, slapping away at them and gagging dramatically once they let go. "Harpies!" He cries, shaking his head. "What's wrong with you two?"

"You knew this whole time?" Harry ignores him, at the same time Hermione says, "What do you mean, a prophecy?"

"Well, to be honest, I don't really know much about them." Ron rubs the back of his head. "Just that they match your description, and that they're held in the Ministry. In the Department of Mysteries, actually, so nobody really knows exactly. Only the person mentioned in the prophecy can get to it."

Harry digests this, solemn. There's only one obvious conclusion to draw.

Telling Ron about her new predicament was both the hardest and easiest thing she's ever done. Working up the courage to reveal it in the first place was far more difficult than stomaching his reaction. Ron's first reaction was to gasp incredibly, looking at her with wide eyes as he enthuses; "You're shagging you-know-who? Wait—you've gotten laid?" And then after a beat; "_Before _me?" She admitted to it, but then insisted with great misery that they haven't actually gotten around to the sex yet.

It sunk in a little bit more after that, but even then his reaction was about the same as Hermione's; a mostly indifferent incredulity. He agreed that he can't tell her who to fancy, even if it is a very strange subject. But he reasons she could've done worse; it could have been Snape. Harry has to admit she can see his point.

She can also see his point now—there's only one reason Voldemort would fixate so deeply on this.

"It's about me, then." She announces resigned, less like a question and more like a statement.

Hermione throws her a concerned glance. "Harry…"

"It makes perfect sense. Why else would he be so interested in having it? Not only that, why would he also think of me when he thinks of the prophecy, if the prophecy wasn't about me?"

Neither of them can refute that.

"Why d'you reckon he wants it so badly?" Ron mulls aloud. "I mean, sure, it's about you. But what does it _say_ about you?"

"An excellent question," Hermione observes, softly.

Harry looks down at the surface of the table they've commandeered in the common room, absently tracing some kind of drawing that someone left in the wood. It sort of looks like a penis, so she's assuming Fred or George. Only they would find that funny.

"Nothing good," Harry answers, at length. "I think he's—worried. About it."

_About me, _goes unsaid.

.

.


	4. i - iv

_._

_._

_._

**PART I**

**.**

**.**

/ CHAPTER 4 /

**17.**

Things come to a head when Harry wakes up at an ungodly hour one Saturday morning with a distinct sense of purpose that definitely doesn't belong to her.

She shakes Hermione awake.

Hermione bats her away.

"Mione!" She hisses, tossing a wary glance at Lavender and Parvati; they are completely dead to the world. It's five in the morning—she wants to join them.

Hermione makes an unintelligible noise.

"You have an exam in ten minutes!" She shouts, and Hermione bolts upright.

"What?" She gasps, but then her attention turns to Harry. "You liar." She scowls.

"Sorry, I had to wake you up." Harry replies, totally unapologetic.

"You succeeded." Hermione harrumphs. "What did you want?"

"It's today." Harry says, flatly.

"What's today?"

"His plan—it's today." She elaborates. "He's going to the Ministry today."

Hermione's eyes widen. She leaps out of her bed, dragging Harry with her. "Why didn't you say something earlier?"

"I only found out a minute ago!" She protests, as Hermione wrenches open her drawer and garments begin to fly out of it with the force of her digging.

Harry has no time to dress; she puts on the first thing she finds. It's a yellow sundress. She would find it more ironic if her life already wasn't some giant cosmic joke.

Hermione is already in the common room, working herself into a frenzy.

"Hermione," Ron groans, stumbling out of the boy's dormitory. "Do you have any idea what time it is?"

"Oh, nevermind that, Ronald!" Hermione snaps. "We need to move—now!"

"Move where?"

"The Ministry!" Hermione practically shouts.

Ron's eyes bulge. "Today?" He looks furiously between Harry and Hermione's grim faces, before coming to the obvious conclusion. "Oh, _Merlin_."

"Exactly." Hermione agrees, succinctly. She turns to Harry. "We need a plan."

Harry blinks at her. "We?"

Her best friend turns to her incredulously. "You don't plan on going alone, do you?"

"Harry!" Ron protests, stumbling down the stairs. "That's madness!"

"No—all of _us _going is madness." Harry retorts.

"You're going to face him, alone?" Ron balks. They both turn to him with matching nonplussed expressions. He grins sheepishly. "Right. Bit of a moot point now, huh?"

Harry sighs, slumping against one of the red and gold armchairs littered about the common room. "Honestly, it's probably best if I go by myself."

She pierces them with an austere, steady look. "He won't kill me. I can't guarantee the same for you two."

They both turn pensive, knowing that Harry is right.

"Then tell someone," Hermione blurts. "Tell the Order—tell Dumbledore!"

"No way," Harry shakes her head, not even bothering to contemplate that. "If Voldemort goes to the Ministry, personally—Hermione, that would be a _disaster. _I'm not going to lie to myself he's—

She swallows. "Dangerous. He's going to kill anyone who stops him and it's going to be a blood bath. I'd be sending them to die."

Her best friend eyes her warily. "But you shouldn't be going alone, either."

"It's the only way," Harry huffs, looking out into the world outside of Hogwarts' manicured lawn. The early morning darkness is silent and still, far removed from whatever horrors the Dark Lord is undoubtedly planning. "I'm the only one who can touch my prophecy… it has to be me."

"Yes," Hermione snaps impatiently. "But: _alone_? Harry, this is ridiculous. You're breaking into the Ministry! How are you supposed to do that by yourself?"

Harry blinks at her, before she laughs. "_Breaking_ in?"

.

.

In the end, Hermione and Ron refuse to let her leave without them. Harry acquiesces, if only to stop Ron's whining.

The whole event is decidedly uneventful. It is an early Saturday morning of no remarkable weather, cold or hot. They use her map and Fred and George's secret passageways to enter into Honeydukes. Ron causes a commotion with the twin's ridiculous Portable Swamp. Ambrosius Flume throws a fit when he sees an enormous, rancid smelling bog pop up in the middle of his shop, and in the interim the trio rush to the back room and use his floo network to travel to the Ministry's office.

Once there, Harry manages to convince Ron and Hermione to stay in the lobby. Well actually, the Minsitry official does; Harry is not only the only person allowed to touch her own prophecy, but she is also the only one allowed inside. Only those mentioned in the prophecies can both pick them up and get to them in the fist place. This of course makes Hermione cross with jealousy, until Harry promises to relay to her every small detail.

The official then hands her over to an 'Unspeakable'—the people who work in the Department of Mysteries.

The wizard doesn't say much to her, simply dropping her off into a towering, cathedral hall full of unending rows of shelves. After relaying to her the prophecy's location—"Shelf 423, Row 25, Slot 25E"—he disappears into thin air. Harry looks around the hollow, ominous cavern. Perhaps she simply calls him back? Or maybe there are stairs back to the top?

The hall sees both vastless and endless, glowing in a prescient, phosphorescent gloom. She feels rather small in comparison to the looming structures; wandering around the base of timeless giants. She wonders how old some of these little blue orbs are. Some appear to have been here for centuries, so caked in dust it is impossible to discern their soft light.

Harry wanders for some time, until she finally stumbles upon shelf number 423. It looks just like every other shelf here. Her neck hurts from craning up to look at it; row _twenty-five_? She can barely even reach row ten! She looks around, hoping to perhaps find her tour guide, a ladder, or maybe even a large stool, but there is nothing in this hall but dust, glass and shelves.

Harry curses, annoyed. Who the hell decided to put a bunch of delicate glass balls on a shelf so high without a ladder? What poor logistical planning.

Very carefully she climbs up the many rows of glass baubles, reaching for her own. Hell, even still she can't quite reach it. What does Voldemort want with this insipid little thing, anyway?

It's not until she's finally face to face with it that she realizes why he has been so obsessively fixated upon it for such a long amount of time.

It's not just her name on the plaque.

_Harriett Rose Potter,_ it reads, and just beneath:

_Tom Marvolo Riddle_

And then her wholly uneventful day gets decidedly more deadly.

"Why, if it isn't little Harry Potter," A high, jeering voice echoes from her left.

Harry sucks in a breath, almost drops the stupid thing before she catches it just seconds before it breaks upon the floor. Irritated, she turns to see who disrupted such a delicate process—

And sees the unhinged face of Bellatrix Lestrange.

She pockets the prophecy, leaping down from her perch, wand aimed upon the dark-haired woman. This only seems to please her; she stalks forward, eyes widening as if she has found a mouse to play with. Harry backs away slowly.

"Now Bellatrix," comes a smooth, warning baritone, emerging from the shadows.

The aristocratic features of Lucious Malfoy part from the darkness. To her horror, there are many more figures wandering out of obscurity.

"I believe the Dark Lord was very clear with his orders, no?" His voice turns cold. "Harry Potter is not to be touched by anyone other than him."

She looks around wildly. Where the hell is her guide? How is it possible for the Ministry to be so absolutely ineffectual, all the time?

"Well this is a little stupid of you, don't you think?" She scowls. Of course it had to be Malfoy here. "Walking into the Ministry in the middle of the day and all."

He smiles slowly. "But we're not in the Ministry, are we?"

She blinks, confused.

He continues; "We're in the Department of Mysteries, and as you may have noticed—it is quite… empty, no?"

Well, he's right about that. There doesn't appear to be a single soul down here aside from them. Great. Don't they have wards for this sort of thing? But this is Voldemort's plan, of course he would have accounted for that. Lord Voldemort doesn't make mistakes.

"Look," she starts, cross. "I'm not here to fight you—or get in the way of whatever you're doing. Are you here for the prophecy? Did Voldemort send you?"

Bellatrix turns her wand to her in rage. "You _dare_ to speak his name you insolent little—

"Bellatrix," The warning in his tone has turned deadly. "Must I remind you again?"

"But surely he wouldn't mind if we had a few minutes of fun, no? Nothing permanent."

"_No_." He barks, caustically. Harry never thought she'd see the day that Lucius Malfoy stood up for her. Again. Judging from his face, he thought the same. She hopes it doesn't have to happen a third time; the universe might just not be able to handle that.

"You still haven't answered my question," she points out.

He sneers. "Nor do I need to. The prophecy, little girl." He holds out a hand.

Hell if she'd let him anywhere near it.

Harry backs away, slow and cautious. "No," she says, to his distinct irritation. "Not until you answer my question. Did he send you?"

She's stalling, it's true. But only until she can see a clear way out of this. On the one hand, she could give it to them—they'd surely take great care in keeping it safe until it reaches Tom. If she does this, though, she may never get the opportunity to hear what it says. If he had kept the whole thing a secret from her the whole time, it would be logical to assume he wouldn't tell her the contents, either.

Malfoy looks annoyed—and impatient. "Yes, you stupid child, that should be obvious. Now, the prophecy, if you will."

She shakes her head, persistent. "But why? Do you know what he wants it for?"

His irritation has turned into fury, but when he opens his mouth Bellatrix beats him to it. "Oh, does little Harry Potter not know?"

Harry spares the woman a narrow, wary glance.

She steps closer, and Harry steps back. "Does she not know what it was that put her life into motion, the very reason her poor, unfortunate parents met their poor, unfortunate end?"

"What are you talking about?" She hisses, incensed that the portentous woman even speaks of her parents at all.

She grins malevolently. "That prophecy is the reason why your parents are—

"Bellatrix!" Lucius cuts her off, grabbing her by the back of her dress—to her vocal and piercing rage—and attempting to haul her back.

Then many things happen at once.

Spells light into the air like bright fireworks, and then the great limbs of the hall shake, little crystalline orbs crashing to the ground in a cacophonous anarchy. Harry dodges out of the way, shielding her eyes as glass splinters everywhere, taking to the air like pieces of scintillating light. Caught in between all this are the death eaters and new figures emerging from the opposite side of the hall—casting spells everywhere, lighting the hall in thousands of colors.

Harry has just enough time to realize the Order has come before she's dodging out of the way again.

It takes her a moment to reconcile the fact that they're here. How did they know—? But of course; she's been down here for ages, Hermione and Ron must have grown worried, realized something was wrong, and probably had just as much luck trying to find that Unspeakable as she did. They must have floo-called one of the teachers—Mcgonagall, probably—who then alerted the Order, who then came to her 'rescue'.

What rescue? Harry snorts. She was perfectly safe!

Although she can see how the Order would believe otherwise. It's not as if _they _know she's secretly shagging the Dark Lord. Well, not shagging, exactly. But certainly getting there, even though they haven't gone very far, and he doesn't appear to be all that urgent to go farther. Which is rather annoying; she could use a little urgency. But—what did Lavender call it? First base? She thinks it had something to do with baseball, but she can't remember it now. But what constitutes as first base, anyway? Just snogging? But what about touching? Or if clothes come off?

Harry cuts herself off.

Oh Merlin, why is she thinking of this now? There are about a thousand more pressing matters to attend to aside from how far or not her and Tom have gone.

"Potter!"

She is jolted back into reality by the scathing voice of Lucius Malfoy.

"What are you doing?" He turns around, incensed, blocking a bright purple spell. And then, when she still stands unmoving, "_Run _you stupid girl!"

That suddenly sounds like a fantastic idea.

She bolts down the hall, the spray of glass and the misty voices of thousands of prophecies trail in her wake. She hears another voice call out to her, but refuses to stop.

She sprints through room after room through the labyrinth of the department, getting herself more and more lost as she attempts to unravel her way out.

Harry ends up in a deathly silent chamber with a high vaulted ceiling—it is as cold and still as death in here, and completely devoid of anything but a flowing curtain, resting on a large podium as the centerpiece of the room. She heaves a breath, bending over onto her knees. To her unending relief her dress is completely unharmed. There's cuts all over her skin, but that's irrelevant. The dress is safe.

"Harry!"

She whirls around. It's—

"Sirius," she breathes in relief. She had no idea what she'd do if it was Lucius Malfoy—or god forbid, Bellatrix.

Her godfather gives her a look of both alarm and reprimand. "What on earth has gotten into you?" He questions sharply, as he makes his way towards her. "Why did you run away like that?"

"I—

"Harry, it was incredibly irresponsible of you to come here all by yourself! If you're friends hadn't called us…" he shakes his head in disbelief. "What are you even doing here?"

"So you knew about it too, I'm assuming?" She retorts accusingly, ignoring his words.

He blinks, taken aback by her tone. "Knew what?"

"About the prophecy!" She shouts. "About _my _prophecy—that everyone seems to have conveniently forgotten to tell me about!"

He sputters. "How do you know about the prophecy?"

"Does it matter?" She snaps, stepping away from him, keeping a distance that he notices with a wounded look.

"Harry," he sighs. "I never meant to hurt you. I didn't tell you because I didn't want you to know—I didn't want to cause you any more pain."

"Cause me—?" She reels back, just as angry as she is confused. "Why? Why does _everyone_ seem to know about this stupid thing but me? What are you hiding?"

He catches up to her finally, grasping her shoulders lightly. A pained look crosses his eyes—fifteen years worth of pain. "Harry, this prophecy… it's affected you more than you know." He whispers, unsteady.

Her eyes flicker to his, growing wide. "What do you mean by that? It's already come true?" But if so, why does everybody care about it still?

He brushes a hand over her head, smoothing out her hair, just above her scar. "Oh, Harry," he says, and his voice is full of regret.

And then he's choking, and pulling her into a crushing embrace. "I'm so sorry…" He breathes into her hair.

Trepidation grows furiously in her throat. "Why?" She whispers, frantically. "Why? What happened? What does it mean?"

He lays a lamenting kiss on her forehead. "It's the reason for everything," he says, quiet. "All the pain in your life, all the horrible events… it's the reason for everything."

Her eyes widen. "How? How could it possibly—

"Unhand her, you foul, mangy dog."

A high, dangerous voice emerges from the shadows, and the Dark Lord rises out of the darkness, a tall, indomitable presence that seems to pull everything into its inescapable gravity: matter, time, space. Even her own thoughts are seized by a mere glance upon him, as if she sits just at the event horizon of a black hole; the most deadliest of nature's creations. In his wake a ripple of inky black spills out from the corners of the room—figures cloaked in gloom.

Sirius growls, backing away, pulling her with him.

"Never!" He spits. "I'll never let you lay a finger on her!"

Too late for that, Harry thinks, hysterical. He's definitely laid a finger on her, many of them actually, many times, all over her—

"Sirius—" she gets out, wondering how in the hell she's going to be able to convince him to let her go. "Stop. You're going to get hurt."

If anything, he holds her tighter. "I don't care," he replies, low and unfaltering. "I'd rather die than let him touch you."

Voldemort looks like he's gotten himself into a proper rage at this point, even though Harry is staring at him with a pleading look. Oh hell, he's definitely going to make good on Sirius' promise. He's going to kill him, if he doesn't hand her over.

She's under no delusions that the Dark Lord will spare him just because he's her godfather.

Harry makes her decision in a split second, and violently pulls away from him.

He looks down at her in shock as she attempts to wiggle her way out of his grip. "Harry—!" He manages to get an arm around her waist, but she's squirming her way out of that too.

She accidentally catches Voldemort's gaze, and is unsurprised to see the level of complete, unmitigated fury lit within them. Finally she pulls out of Sirius' arms with a well timed jab of her elbow—a move she's perfected over the year with Dudley and his 'Harry hunting'—and is tearing away from him when more figures dart into the room, spraying bright lights in their wake.

And then Bellatrix stalks her way through the crowd of death eaters, aiming a crazed look at her cousin, "_Avada Kadevra!_"

Harry's eyes widen. She takes one look at it and then pivots back and throws Sirius out of the way. He tumbles to the left, hitting his head as he crashes into the ground and rolls towards the wall, unconscious but still alive. Meanwhile she stumbles backwards, narrowly misses the sickly flash of light. It shoots past her and grounds itself into the marble floor. She stares down at it in total horror; good god, it missed her by _inches…_

By the time she looks up Bellatrix is on the floor, and her horrifying, strangled cries are filling the room, louder than the spells and the fighting, piercing Harry's ears at an almost inhuman decibel. Harry is no fan of the woman, and yet her own flesh crawls in response to the sound.

The Dark Lord strides forward, viperous. "What have I told you, Bellatrix, about Harry Potter?" He hisses, quiet and deadly, as he releases her from whatever curse he'd placed upon her.

She sobs. "That no one can touch her but you!"

"That is correct," Voldemort agrees, dangerous. "So why, then, did I see a _killing curse_ thrown at her? Of all things?"

"I didn't mean to!" Bellatrix cries. "I'm sorry, Master, please forgive me—I only wanted to attack the useless scourge upon the Black name—

"I don't want to hear your excuses," he interrupts her, cold. "Get up. We're not done here."

Harry watches all of this with wide, horrified eyes, feeling far more frightened than she ever has before when his vesuvian eyes turn to her.

The Order and the Death Eaters have begun their duels in earnest, flooding into the hall; Voldemort ignores all of them, advancing on her with the determination of a single-minded purpose. She takes a hesitant step back; the anger hasn't faded from his eyes. If anything, it seems to have doubled. He pays them no mind, erecting a powerful barrier around them, protecting them both from spells and prying eyes in a little bubble of magic.

"You impudent, foolish child!" He rounds on her when he's near enough, with embroiled, flaming eyes, burning brighter than any star or sun. She flinches. "Do I even want to know how you managed to find yourself in this predicament?"

"I—I didn't mean to—" She stammers, but he cuts her off.

"Didn't mean to what?" He interrupts with great ire. "Traipse through the Department of Mysteries, completely and utterly ruining everything I've planned? It's astounding, actually, how you always manage to so easily upend all of my work in a matter of seconds!"

This incenses her anger.

"Everything you've planned?" She echoes, furious,, crossing her arms, "Funny, what exactly have you been planning? I haven't heard anything about it, and considering it's _my_ prophecy: rather curious, no?"

"It doesn't have anything to do with you—

"_It doesn't have anything to do with me_?" She repeats, incredulous, talking over him. "Really? Aside from the fact that it has my name on it and it just happens to be entirely about me?"

His eyes narrow. "Why are you here, Harry?" He goes from furious heat to burning cold in a matter of seconds, giving her whiplash.

"What do you mean?"

"On the subject of curious events," he begins, ominously, "How exactly did you manage to find yourself in this particular room of the Department of Mysteries on this particular day? This hour, even? It's all rather… coincidental, isn't it?"

The unrepentant, rebellious features falter slightly. "Well, I…"

"Do not lie to me, Harry," he warns.

She purses her lips, searching his gaze. He is really, really mad. This is probably not the time to attempt to fiddle her way out of this.

"I saw you thinking about it," she admits, finally. "About a prophecy—a prophecy about me. And when I saw that you were going to go to the Ministry to retrieve it I—

"You what?" The rage returns with a vengeance. "Decided to foil my plans? Did Dumbledore put you up to this? Have you turned against me, Harry?"

Harry blinks wide eyes, uncomprehending.

"_Have you?"_ Voldemort roars, closing the gap between them and grasping her chin.

"No! I didn't turn against you!" She cries, outraged, once she's come over her shock, "I was trying to help you!"

He sneers. "How could you have possibly been trying to help me?"

"Because I thought it was _my _prophecy!" She hisses, low and furious, "I thought I was the only one who could touch it! And you've fixated on the stupid thing for months—I thought it would be easier and a lot less violent if I simply picked it up myself!"

And then, irascible, "And it worked, _by the way_." She crosses her arms. "All I had to do was go up to the Ministry and ask them for it. I could have easily picked it up and brought it back to you and we could have solved all of this in five seconds!"

This seems to deflate his anger, and in turn she finds her own fury slipping away like water in her hands.

Voldemort regards her with a searching, taciturn gaze. She meets it, warily. He releases her.

And then, high and soft, "Did it not occur to you that, perhaps, there might be a reason I did not want you to know of its existence?"

Harry blinks, taken aback. Then her gaze sharpens. "Oh, you mean other than the fact that you knew it all along and conveniently forgot to mention that there was a _prophecy_ about me? How could you think that wasn't important for me to know? It's _about_ me!"

"And me," he adds, darkly.

"Yeah," she notes, flatly. "Another thing you forgot to mention."

He looks as if he might yell at her for that too. But then he sighs. And then, with considerably less heat and—to her surprise—a look of concern and unease; "Harry, the contents of this prophecy were said long before you were born. And they… will cause you nothing but pain."

"Why?" She asks, quiet. "What could it have possibly said?"

He doesn't answer, because he is hauling her out of the center of the room and off to the sides, where it is far safer. A coruscate of lights cross through the air behind him, explosions and shouts ricocheting down the walls. The magical barrier moves with them, deflecting or absorbing any stray spells that cross its way. Behind its shimmering wall she can see the battle waging on. She has eyes for absolutely none of it; all of her attention is fixated solely on him.

Her eyes search his face, dread growing in the absence of rage. "Tom," she whispers, wavering. "What did it say?"

He finds he cannot look away from the naked fear in her virescent eyes. They are so incredibly green—a most haunting color, a lethal, dangerous color; the color of death. How very, ironically, prophetic—the deadly color that almost killed her, now so intimately a part of her. The consequences of his actions define her entire life; the doomed childhood, the death of her parents, the splintered soul inside of her, the very color of her eyes—how is he to tell her this?

"Tom," she says again, drawing closer. He almost manages to regain his composure—

And then her attention snaps away from him towards something over his shoulder.

She bolts past him, and he manages to grasp her by the arm before she darts head first into the chaos.

It's that obnoxious dog. Bellatrix blasts the mangy cretin away, and it all appears to happen in such excruciating, wonderfully slow detail.

His body flies through the air, and he sees the woman's eyes widen with glee and realizes that Sirius Black is about to meet his untimely death as he soars into the path of the veil. This of course does not mean much to him, but Harry jerks in his grip as her godfather flies towards the altar, jarring him into shock. His eyes widen as he tightens his grip; is she truly so foolish, or simply so loyal? Does she not know what will greet her on the other side of that veil?

She finally manages to struggle out of his grip. "_Sirius—!" _And sprints full speed to her death, clearly intent on following him into the abyss.

When it becomes clear that she will unquestionably attempt to dive in after him, Voldemort waves him out of the way with a scowl. The insufferable man dodges the veil, rolling into the wall. In the interim he manages to catch up to her and get a better grip on her wrist, as all the fight leaves her.

"Sirius…" she breathes, her eyes still trained towards the man with desperation.

This annoys him greatly, a foreign emotion he is unprepared to find growing in his throat: jealousy. Harry should not look at anyone like that—anyone else but him, that is. Fortunately it is at this moment that they turn to him, blinking and beguiling and full of a tenderness he is equally as unprepared to see.

"You saved him," she says, dazed.

He sneers. "I saved _you_," Voldemort corrects, livid anger returning. She flinches at the coldness in his voice, at least somewhat chastised. Even this does not satisfy him; how can it, when he knows the root of this vivid fury stems from an unending and unbreakable concern for her wellbeing? That she so stupidly disregards at the most inopportune of times? "What possessed you to try to do something so _stupid_?"

He rounds on her, and she shrinks back. The fright in her eyes only makes him angrier; why must he care so deeply about the mercurial whims of a silly little teenage girl?

"I—I didn't—

He draws closer. "There is nothing on the other side of that veil but _death_. Is that what you want?"

"What? No!" She shakes her head wildly, and he feels himself grow angrier still. Her fear should satisfy him, the wariness grasping her face and the shaking of her shoulders are all things that should elicit triumph within him. Finally Harry Potter has learned to fear him as all others do—finally, when he no longer wants her to.

It takes an unbelievable effort to reign in his anger. "Harry," he says, "I am not trying to scare you, but you are making it very difficult to remain calm."

She frowns up at him. "I'm sorry," she whispers. "I don't mean to make you angry."

But the hesitant, humbled look is even worse. He brings a hand to his temples. "Then _think_ before you so stupidly act upon whatever impulse has taken your fancy— for the sake of my blood pressure, at the very least."

She smiles very slightly at that, nodding. "I'll try," she promises.

Well, with that out of the way, he still hasn't found a suitable way to get her out of here—without the prophecy going with her. But he cannot think of a way to take it from her that doesn't involve some modicum of violence; he doubts she'd hand it over of her own volition. Especially not when she's clearly insistent upon knowing its contents. And he is just as insistent on never letting that happen. He only knows the first few lines himself, and those few lines condemned her parents and her to death. He cannot even imagine what the rest of it is going to say.

No viable solution presents itself. Not one that wouldn't end with her betrayed, hurt face staring up at him., at any rate.

He eyes her critically. Perhaps there is a way…

"Harry," he begins, with infinitely more equanimity than he feels, "I am only looking out for your wellbeing. I assure you I did not hide this from you out of spite, or whatever other ridiculous motivations you've concocted—and I daresay that everyone else who knew hasn't, either."

At the very least, she appears to be listening to him seriously.

"Do you think that I, or even your precious Dumbledore, would have kept it from you without a good reason?" He hates to have to associate himself with Albus Dumbledore in any manner at all, but in this they appear to at least share a common goal. He reminds himself once more that he shouldn't care at all for the fickle emotions of a teenager: it, once more, does very little to stop him from doing it anyway.

"No," she admits, in a small voice.

"Or even your aggravating, insipid godfather?"

"No," she says again.

He holds out a hand. "Give it to me, Harry."

_Trust me_, is what he is saying. Even though he has never given her a reason to do so—if anything, he has only ever give her reasons to forever think the worst of him. And yet, her composure wavers, something yielding and soft taking its place.

She pulls a small, cesious orb out of the pocket of her dress—his dress, he notices with surprise; it glimmers brightly in the light of the room—luminous, sparkling, and ominous.

Harry walks towards him, opening her palm for him to take it.

Except at the very last moment she jerks it away.

He looks up, furious, to see a mutinous expression of complete resolve looking back at him. "Just tell me this, Tom," she holds it aloft, just out of reach. "Is this prophecy…" and here her determination wavers, belying her fear.

She falters slightly. "Is this prophecy the reason why you murdered my parents?"

The question catches him in comprehensive surprise, even though it really shouldn't have.

And what is he to say to this? Once again, how is he supposed to tell her that the blue sphere in her hand is accountable for the tragedy that is her life?

"Yes," he answers, quietly, for there is nothing else he can say. A horrible sadness blooms in her eyes. "Harry—"

But he is interrupted.

The room and the fighting has fallen still as a blinding presence announces itself across the death chamber: Albus Dumbledore himself strolls out of a brilliant white light, the Order of the Phoenix spreading out in his wake.

.

.

.

"Professor Dumbledore…" Harry feels her heart seize for the second time this day.

What is she even doing here? What possessed her to do something to foolish? Tom is right—it's as if whatever self-preservations she's learned from living with him has completely deserted her, leaving only her headstrong, impulsive Gryffindor bravery in its place. She should have never tried to get the prophecy herself—she'd thought she was the only one who could, because only the person mentioned in the prophecy can touch it—but she should have known that Voldemort would not have kept her uninformed if that was truly the case. He knew all along that his name was on it too.

His eyes turn towards her, and she feels caught in the gaze, heart shuddering to a halt, all the blood in her veins freezing all at once.

"Dumbledore," Voldemort drawls, high and cold.

She whirls around at the sound of his voice, but finds he has moved away from her, prowling into the center of the room.

"Have you come to rescue your precious Savior?"

Harry's eyes flicker towards Dumbledore, who looks upon her with a quiet observance, and Voldemort, who spares her a cold look of disregard, before turning his attention back to Dumbledore. She feels a sting of hurt at the look of it; so unfeeling and dismissive, as if she was nothing but a tedious fly. It makes her grow angry, actually; why is he doing this? But she is thinking as a Gryffindor, and Lord Voldemort is anything but. He is a Slytherin; they are cunning, sly—always manipulating the situation towards their own benefit.

He is disassociating himself from her, treating her as he would treat Harry Potter, the girl who lived, a girl he wants to see eradicated from the earth. He looks upon her as if she's the enemy.

Her breath stills in her throat.

He's giving her a way out. A way to stay neutral through this conflict. Even though she is still quite mad at him—not to mention completely distrustful, considering he's been hiding a prophecy with both their names on it—a warmth grows in her chest at the thought.

"Harry, my dear girl," Dumbledore turns to her, ignoring the Dark Lord's taunting hiss, a pleasant smile upon his lips. "Are you alright?"

Harry regards him warily. "Yes," she nods, barely above a whisper.

His smile grows. "I am glad to hear it."

"Enough of this," Voldemort drawls, re-claiming Dumbledore' attention with a powerful display of magic; a grandiloquent fiery dragon erupts from his wand, seizing the air in a white hot heat as it dives for the Order members.

"I feel it's time I rid the world of your irritating presence, Dumbledore."

Harry covers her eyes, unable to watch—unable to make up her mind, her feelings, or even move her feet.

"It was foolish of you to come here tonight. The Aurors are on their way—"

"By which time I shall be gone," he interrupts. "And you, dead!"

If she had thought it chaotic before—it is utterly cataclysmic now. The barrage of spells from both the Death Eaters and the Order continue to streak through the air, but now they are accompanied by the most astounding clash of magic she's ever seen; the Dark Lord and Albus Dumbledore light the air with a power so strong it licks against her skin like waves of electricity. She doesn't know where to look; who to worry about, who to help. She is split in two, unable (and unwilling) to make the choice.

The thrumming power she has always felt with every touch, coiled beneath his skin like a restless beast—it burns through both matter and energy; a starless strength in a physical force. It is unlike anything she has ever seen, taking her breath away. For the very first time, she can see why so many people flocked to this man, following him unerringly, enchanted by this magnificent strength. But how could they not? So violent and captivating, much like the man who wields it.

It's clear to see they're evenly matched. For every catastrophic display of magic, Dumbledore has a response, gliding across the floor, shooting spell after spell; quiescent, but just as tremendous. They circle each other so leisurely, as if the magic they make is not utterly unbelievable.

It's over all too soon.

Two clashing streams of light exploding into each other, draping the ground in dripping sparkles of red and green. It twists violently like vicious lightning, before it snaps uncontrollably and grounds itself—almost directly next to her. She yelps, jumping out of the way before she can die from a simultaneous killing curse and expelliarmus.

The two look at her in matching looks of total horror, their identical expressions almost funny, if she was in the mood to think anything at all was funny. Dumbledore and Voldemort identical in anything was ridiculous.

They are not the only two who witnessed her near-death.

Sirius rips out of the chaos, fear and terror so prevalent on his face. He barrels straight to her, wrapping her in his arms with a force that chokes the breath out of her. He looks worse for wear; though he escaped death unscathed twice now, he still looks terrible.

"Oh sweet Merlin, Harry," He breathes, holding her even tighter, cradling her head as if it would break. "You almost—…Harry," He sobs.

"Sirius," she pats his back, a bit awkwardly with this angle. "It's okay. I'm okay."

"You could have died!" He shakes her. "Hell, you could have died at least a dozen times already!" He looks around wildly. "I need to get you out of here—there has to be a way—

"Get me out of—" She blinks, rapidly. "Sirius, I don't need to—

He ignores her. "The Order can cover for us," he mutters, more to himself than anything else. "We can probably reach the floo network from here."

He hauls her across the room, even as she drags her feet, struggling as much as humanly possible without resorting to hitting him in the face and running off. "Harry, stop being stubborn! This isn't the place for you… you're going to get _hurt_. There's already been too many close calls—but we'll get you safe, don't you worry!"

"Sirius!" She snaps, "Stop trying to dictate my life for a second, _please_."

Predictably, he completely disregards everything she says.

She loves him, she really does—he's her godfather, practically the only family she's got left. But by _Merlin_ does he love to tell her what to do. Just like everyone else in the Order (and the world at large), he assumes he knows what's best for her. More absurd; even Voldemort doesn't do that. Well, he lets her make her own decisions, but then tells her exactly why they're stupid so she doesn't do them anyway.

"_Sirius!_"

Again, he ignores her and continues his trek to the other side of the chamber, even as she flails impotently in his grip.

"No," she whispers, as Sirius tugs her insistently, dragging her towards Dumbledore, towards the Order.

Away from Tom.

"No!"

She wrenches out of his grip, for the second time that day.

He looks at her, bewildered, uncomprehending. "What are you doing?" He shouts, impatiently. "Harry—hurry!" He holds a hand out to her.

She doesn't take it.

Sirius stares at her, unmoving, shock and confusion written across his face. "_Harry_…" But she only shakes her head, clearly unwilling to return to him.

His reaching hands slowly, almost mechanically, return to his sides. Harry backs away slowly, never once taking her eyes off his despondent form. The disbelief, the pain—the inevitable realization of what this means—she sees it all. It hurts just as much as she thought it would; she doesn't even want to see the expressions of all the other Order members, of everyone she's betraying. The commotion has incurred the attention of almost everyone in the room.

It is a crushing, sorrowful pain that paralyzes each and every nerve in her body, as if even her blood has slowed to a halt.

But it would be nothing in comparison to what she would feel if she had done the opposite. If she had betrayed Voldemort instead.

She couldn't—she couldn't go against her own soul. That doesn't mean she wants to see the glinting satisfaction and triumph in his eyes, either. But when she turns away from them, turns towards him, there is nothing of the sort. He looks… regretful, almost. Which is ridiculous. Lord Voldemort doesn't regret anything, just as he never apologizes, or admits wrong. And yet, there is certainly at least an acknowledgement of her grief in his eyes.

It flickers away just as quickly as it appeared, replaced, unsurprisingly, by a reveling look of vindication.

"Come here, Harry," he commands, ever so softly, and yet his voice rings loud and demanding in the unending silence.

She obeys.

Her feet take her to him, so close that he can trail a languid hand and place it atop her head, petting her indulgently like a particularly well-behaved pet. She doesn't even care. Let him play whatever cruel games he likes, she doesn't want to be a part of the convoluted, antagonistic relationship that exists between Voldemort and Dumbledore. His hand slides into her hair, drawing her closer. Harry goes willingly, until her face is buried in the fabric of his robes.

"Surprised, Dumbledore?" He drawls, supreme and vindictive.

"Very much so," replies Dumbledore, with considerably less heat than she imagined. If anything, he sounds rather cheerful.

"What will you do now, I wonder?" Voldemort's words are high and soft, but carry like a heavy weight in the still, silent air. "How will you defeat the Dark Lord without your beloved Savior?"

She doesn't have to see him to know he's smiling. "Oh, I'm sure there are other ways."

She can feel Voldemort's pensiveness, his annoyance when Dumbledore refuses to rise to the bait. Even this does absolutely nothing to douse the utter triumph in his veins, the satisfaction he gains from seeing the Order of the Phoenix look so pained and conflicted, from watching his sweet little Harry make her choice—choosing him above all else, walking into his arms willingly.

He runs long, elegant fingers through her hair. "Yet you put so much stock in a useless prophecy; put all your hopes on a little girl to vanquish the Dark Lord. It's all so very… _touching._ A hero to rise above and save the world for you—why bother to fight yourself, when there is someone to do it for you?"

"You have put just as much stock in it as I," Dumbledore points out.

Voldemort ignores him. "I think it rather meaningless now though, don't you?"

"Well," replies Dumbledore cheerfully. "I suppose there's only one way to find out, no?"

Voldemort tenses, grabbing her almost painfully, raising his wand to defend from whatever Dumbledore has in store—

But it's not directed towards him.

Something burns in her pocket, and then begins to fight it's way out of the fabric of her dress. It tears away from her before she can stop it, soaring into the air; an insignificant, diminutive light tossed high above.

Voldemort casts his own spell, and the sphere stops, caught in an invisible battle of magic.

Harry is not paying any of this attention, irrationally more concerned over the state of her dress than the war for the prophecy. She breaths a sigh of relief when she sees that it hadn't ripped through the flimsy lemon-colored linen.

Something hurtles to the ground and shatters with a loud crash. All at once the room grows still and cold; as if all the air had been replaced with ice.

Harry turns around; slow, fearful, and hoping against all reason that what happened isn't what she thinks happened.

It is.

"_The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches…born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies_," Intones a weirdly familiar voice. She doesn't know why, but the sound of it makes her want to kick something.

"_And the Dark Lord will mark them as his equal, but they will have the power the Dark Lord knows not,"_

Voldemort holds her tightly, expression cold and unreadable, but he holds her impossibly close, belying his trepidation.

"Tom," she whispers, almost inaudible, gripping his just as tightly as his alarm makes hers grown tenfold. "Tom—

"_And either must die at the hand of the other…" _

She chokes.

" _For neither can live while the other survives_…"

Almost absently does she finally realize where she's heard this voice before; in a smoky, almost unbearably hot room at the top of castle.

"… _the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies_."

But of course it's Trelawney, is the only coherent thought she can pull together. It _would_ be that stupid old bint of a woman who completely ruins the entirety of her life. It's so funny it's tragic.

Her ghostly voice disappears in wavering smoke, and with it the unmoving silence. Volemort roars furiously, tearing away from her, and the world erupts once more into chaotic violence, his anger channeling into the most magnificent, horrifying magic she's ever seen.

She might even think it beautiful, had she the capacity to think at all.

How many times is her life going to go wrong? Is it just that the universe hates her? Is she not allowed to be happy—not even once? Trelawney continues on in her head, an infinite loop of destruction, and around it are graceful fingers brushing against her hair, warm skin, the almost intangible touch of lips brushing against her forehead.

Wetness rolls down her cheeks, silent, as if entirely of their own volition.

She wills herself to stop crying, but is completely incapable of it.

She is so still and quiet; the calm calamity at the center of the destruction around her. Soundless bones, drowning at the hollow remains of her chest, collapsing inwards from skin to soul. Streaks of green light, the same color of her eyes, dart across the room, leaving sparkling reflections upon the marble that hold her indifferent gaze; a fair form of mouldering vacancy.

The whole chamber seems to shake apart with the force of Voldemort's fury. Not even Dumbledore can negate its effects completely, the very walls themselves beginning to collapse, splintered by a great, terrible power. The Death Eaters rally behind him, and the Order matches every spell blasted their way, even as they retreat upon themselves. They might actually even be losing, but she can't bring herself to care.

She doesn't know why it is in this moment that the Dark Lord looks up, and catches sight of her—why now, when he has his greatest enemy on the retreat, the Order members withdrawing with him, with Dumbledore's death a very feasible outcome.

He catches her wide, frightened gaze. As always, his infinite rage cools at the very sight of her—trembling, broken, tears streaming down her face. She backs away from him, from all of them, from all of it; removing herself from everything. Her shaking hands trail up to her throat, where she clasps then tightly around—

A necklace.

"Home," she sobs, in a shaking whisper. "I want to go home."

.

.

.

**18.**

The curtains are clasped shut, and the lights are off. The room is submerged in an unending, profound darkness.

Harry likes it likes this.

She wants to lie in here forever; maybe even die here.

_But I can't even do that, can I?_ She thinks, bitterly. _Either must die at the hands of the other. _

Tears have spotted her pillow, but she is numb to them as they stream down her face. Her heart has been torn out of her chest, collected off the Ministry floor but lost somewhere that she cannot follow, like when her pens roll off the table into what seems like a pocket universe. This brings forth hysterical, sorrowful laughter. It would be so much simpler if she could throw her heart into another space in time. If she couldn't feel anything at all.

If she couldn't feel anything for _him_.

She stiffens involuntarily; something effervescent blossoms in the bottom of her chest, though she refuses to acknowledge it. A stinging pain that is not hers blisters against her ribs. She refuses to acknowledge that too.

"Harry," he says, soft, from the other side of the door.

His voice carries towards her, so quiet and gentle—but how can something so gentle come from something so terrible?

"_Harry,"_ that's more like it. There is a bite of command in his sharp tone.

It's not locked. Not because she couldn't, but because she knew it would be useless anyway. As if an alohomora could possibly stop him.

"No," her voice is just as soft, but stricken with sorrow and thick with tears. "please… just leave me alone."

She wants to be alone. She wants to be alone in here forever, if only to escape the reality outside.

To her great surprise he does. His presence dwindles, until she cannot feel him any longer. He's still in the mansion somewhere, but he has—for all intent purposes—left her alone. Good. Her eyes slip closed, but the tears don't stop. They absolutely refuse to, no matter what she tries, only stopping when she finally succumbs to exhaustion and falls asleep.

.

.

.

He is there when she wakes up.

Harry is not all that surprised to see him there, perched upon the side of her bed, an imitation from what seems like a lifetime ago. She doesn't want to look at him; the brief vulnerability in his eyes that seizes at her foolish heart.

She wants to hate him, but that is utterly impossible, so instead she closes her eyes again, and tries to pretend he isn't there.

This works about as well as she imagined it to.

After a moment she opens them again, blinking up at him with an unreadable expression. Why can she no longer see him as a horrid monster from her deepest nightmares? Why is it not the lethal crimson of his eyes that she sees, but the conflicted, unguarded silver, that flickers in his gaze? There is no monster in front of her: there is an adolescent boy with tears streaming down his face, staring sightlessly at the lifeless form of his father; that same boy, ignored so conclusively by his peers; a form beside her, sweet lips upon her temple when he thinks she's asleep; an intimate, absent hand on the small of her back.

And then she is flinging herself at him faster than he can move to stop her.

The dark lord catches her weight, startled, staring down into the haphazard mess of cinerous hair, the arms that wrap around him, as if he is the only thing to anchor upon in this world.

"I can't," she sobs, completely incomprehensible and also insensible, "I don't want to—… I don't... " Her sobs grow uncontrollable, as do her tears. "_I can't," _she mumbles, over and over again.

If possible, she clings tighter.

This is quite possibly the most horrifying situation he has ever been in. How does one comfort a young girl? How does one comfort, _at all_? He has never had the misfortune of needing to learn, and is at a loss as to what he's supposed to do. Does he scold her? No, that doesn't sound right. Soothe her, then? But what could he possibly say? Is he supposed to hug her back? But he doesn't even know how to do _that_, either. She quiets eventually, to his unending relief, though she does not loosen her grip.

Harry refuses to look up—or remove herself from the dark lord, for that matter. He is as still as stone beneath her, but this does not deter her from burying into his robes, hiding in the curve of his shoulder. And when she feels him move to pull away she holds tighter, dragging him down with her until they're lying on the bed. He stiffens in shock, but she does not look up.

"Please don't leave me," she whispers, against all reason. As if he isn't utterly incapable of it, anyway.

There is a moment, then he relaxes again.

"_I won't_," he replies, but it is so quiet that perhaps she imagined it.

She finally releases him from her unrelenting grip, though she still trembles in his arms. The silence between them is unending, a gossamer veil that breaks them apart. It's after long moments of this that she finds her voice.

"It's not true… right?" She murmurs into his chest, still hiding there. He debates pulling her away.

He sighs, deciding it's probably better for both of them to just let her be. "I think you already know the answer to that."

Her hands tighten in the folds of his cloak; pale pink lost in the sea of blackness.

"I don't _want_ it to be true," she denies.

Almost unwillingly does his hand find its way into her phosphorescent hair. He doesn't want it to be true, either. His endless anger has left him, though, leaving him somber and hollow.

He has no comfort to give her: no words to reassure her.

"Then don't," he finds himself saying, after long, sunlit silence has passed between them.

Her fingers hold fast against him.

"A prophecy is only as true as you let it be."

They clench tighter. "Oh? You mean as true as _you _let it be?"

"Harry…"

Her voice shakes. "Why did you have to do it, Tom?"

This is, undeniably, the last conversation he wants to have with her. Her words incense him; a stinging pain bites into his chest and a reflexive anger overtakes it. "Would you have done any different in my place?" He bites out, acidulous.

"I wouldn't kill anyone!" She refutes, vehement.

"Even at the cost of yourself?" He presses, voice rising without his consent.

Harry pushes away from him, burning, livid eyes fixed angrily upon him. "No! I would find another way—there's always another way!"

"There were no other ways!" He hisses, furious. "It was _prophesized. _What was I to do? Allow the possibility of my death to come to pass?"

"Why would you believe it in the first place?" She yells back at him.

"I was not thinking of its validity!" He shouts back. "Only of its premonition! I could not allow such a potential enemy to exist!"

She flinches back. A nebulous ache emerges in his chest when he catches sight of her expression; profound sadness.

"Is that what I am?" She whispers, desolate, "An enemy?"

Of course not. This is absurdly and remarkably untrue. She is so far from that it's laughable. Not that you would be able to tell from her expression, the utter desolation sifting upon her face.

"No," he sighs, deflating. "Of course not. How could you possibly think that?"

"What am I supposed to think?" She retorts, luminous eyes looking lost.

He stares upon her, an indeterminable feeling swelling inside him. There is a cataclysmic shine to her eyes that denotes the horrifying prospect of more tears; an unmoving portrait of sadness, endless upon her face.

"You are the keeper of my soul," he whispers, stoic and fearful. "There is nothing more dear to me than you."

The lacinated expression breaks, giving way to lament and regret. The afflicted warmth in her eyes is not an answer.

But it is enough.

The unfathomable child returns to him, folding in against him, tiny hands skimming down his arms. She grabs his in an intimate, familiar gesture; lining their palms up until all their fingers touch. A stark contrast: lissome fingers stretched against him, so delicate and fragile. His own, much larger—it would take absolutely nothing to crush them. It would take absolutely nothing to crush _her._

He doesn't. He indulges her, as she looks upon them with such deep fixation, threading her fingers into his own.

After long moments, her great eyes turn away from their hands, buried back into his cloak.

"Why did you use the killing curse?" She mumbles, finally. "You could have just thrown me out a window, you know."

He pauses. This is true.

Had he done that, he would have been saved from the great headache that is Harry Potter. The prophecy would have been useless anyway. A simple future would spread before him; the perfect path to world domination. But then it occurs to him that, if the prophecy had never existed, if he had never heard those first lines, if he had never came to the Potter's house that Hollow's Eve—had he killed her through physical means… she would not be here right now. And it is with great surprise that he realizes he wouldn't give this up. Had he the choice to change this fate, he would not. He would not lose her.

The thought is utterly terrifying.

Against all reason, he finds an unwilling smile quirk into existence, "Fortunately," he replies, "I was not half as clever as you are."

Her eyes reveal themselves from their hiding spot in his robes, blinking up at him, wide and bright in an otherwise unsubstantial world. He can feel the smile against his chest.

"That's not true," she murmurs, soft and facile, "you are far more clever than I am."

"You can solve every crossword in the Prophet in under ten minutes," she adds, and a laugh of surprise is drawn out of him.

"That is not at all indicative of intelligence," he remarks, amused. Her face emerges from the vermillion mane of hair, smiling with a brilliance that brings him great relief, welcome and unexpected.

"Well, I'm sure there are other things you do that are," she amends, and a warm hand trails up towards his face.

_This is not one of them, _he thinks, when she touches his lips with great hesitation, as if scared he might somehow, against all reason, still have the strength to push her away. If he was truly that clever, he would have frozen her in a block of magical ice or kept her immobile in a tower under the draught of living death. She is his infinite weakness, in every single capacity, yet he cannot find it in him to hate her for this.

And when he pins her down, and she reaches for him, eager and insistent, he knows that, even if he truly was that clever, he would never give this up.

.

.

.

He still cannot come to terms with how easily she falls asleep in his presence—how unguarded she is, whenever he is around. He has no delusions about himself; since he was a mere child people knew to be apprehensive of him, wary, cautious. Even then they knew he was dangerous, that he was something not to be trusted. That there was something treacherous that clung to his very being.

Yet this enchanting creature dozes against him as if this is the most logical thing to do in the world.

He thinks again that it would be all too easy to crush her, to destroy this lilting little piece of life, as it breathes in opalescence, carried into dreams. So vulnerable, so bare to him.

Instead, a wayward hand reaches up to brush away a drift of hair, a glowing chrome line skimming down the side of her face. His starless, atramentous soul does not deserve such a lovely tenant, just as he does not deserve every breathtaking, effervescent smile that wanders his way.


End file.
